Official List Of Patronage Of Saints?

[oremus1]

Just wondering, is there an official list of patronages? Or is it just something decided by the public?

 

 

[Basilisa Marie]

Both I think?

I think popular devotion is what drives what each saint gets to be the patron of, which is partly why some saints have really bizarre patronages. But the Church does recognize many of these patronages officially - not necessarily in a decision made from up top, but this is a situation where something decided on and grown up from the bottom is just as official. Like how St. Michael is a patron of policemen and firefighters, St. Anthony is who you ask when you've lost something (I sought his help yesterday AND IT WORKED WHAT?!), St. Francis is a patron of animals, St. Aloysius Gonzaga is a patron of students, etc.  But then you have people like St. Perpetua who is a patron of cows because she was almost killed by one... and it just keeps getting a bit more obscure and weird. 

 

So I guess what I'm getting at is that it doesn't necessarily have to be such an either/or the way you framed it. If you're asking for a kind of "master list," I don't really know if there is one. I start with Butler and Catholic Online and go from there. 

[AveMariaPurissima]

http://saints.sqpn.com/ is another good resource, especially for finding out who's patron of what. :)