Feast day: December 6

Patron of:

• against famine
• against fire
• against imprisonment
• against robbers
• against storms at sea
• against sterility
• against thefts
• altar servers
• archers
• brides
• captives
• children
• happy marriages
• lawsuits lost unjustly
• lovers
• maidens
• penitent murderers
• newlyweds
• pilgrims
• poor people
• prisoners
• scholars
• students
• penitent thieves
• travellers
• unmarried girls
• apothecaries
• bakers
• bankers
• barrel makers
• boatmen
• brewers
• butchers
• button makers
• candle makers
• chair makers
• cloth shearers
• coopers
• dock workers
• educators
• farm workers
• farmers
• firefighters
• fish mongers
• fishermen
• grain merchants
• grocers
• grooms
• hoteliers
• innkeepers
• judges
• lace merchants
• lawyers
• linen merchants
• longshoremen
• merchants
• millers
• notaries
• parish clerks
• pawnbrokers
• perfumers
• pharmacists
• poets
• sailors
• ship owners
• shoe shiners
• soldiers
• spice merchants
• spinners
• stone masons
• tape weavers
• toy makers
• vintners
• watermen
• weavers

Nicholas was a priest, an abbot, and the Archbishop of Myra which is now Lycia in modern Turkey. In the east he is known as Saint Nicholas the Wonderworker due to the miracles associated with him. Many stories attest to his faith, piety, and the influence he had on those around him. One story recounts how he saved three men from death. The men sentenced to death unjustly by the governor who had been bribed. As the executioner held his sword over the first of the men, preparing to strike, Nicholas stepped up and took the sword from his hand. The Governor, denounced by Saint Nicholas for his wrong doing, repented and begged for forgiveness.