In Thanksgiving for the Eucharist

Today we celebrate Thanksgiving.  As our wonderful priest told us this last weekend, for a Catholic this happens every time we go to Mass as we celebrate the Eucharist....Greek for thanksgiving!  Today's saint truly loved the Eucharist and all that it means for those who believe that our God can truly give to us in the Eucharist himself!

St. Conrad of Constance

Feast day: November 26
Born: 900
Death: 975
Patron of Germany
Noble family of Germany

Conrad was educated at the cathedral school in Constance and ordained a priest.  He soon assisted the bishop and was ready to take the episcopal seat in 934 when he was elected bishop.  At this time, he gave up all forms of his inheritance to the Church and the poor.  He also began building and repairing many churches within his diocese.

In 962, Conrad was asked to accompany the emperor to Rome.  Conrad agreed, but only so he could take care of religious matter, remaining distant to any political matters at hand.  Conrad also made pilgrimage trips to Jerusalem in order to bring back a piece of the True Cross for his diocese.

He remained the bishop of Constance for 42 years.

Saint Conrad is sometimes represented as a bishop holding a chalice with a spider in it or over it. This refers to a story that once when he was celebrating mass a spider fell into the chalice. Spiders were believed at that time to be deadly poisonous, but Conrad nevertheless drank the Blood of Christ, which had been transubstantiated from wine, with the spider in it, as a token of faith.