St. Peter Canisius

On December 21 the Church honors St. Peter Canisius (1521-1597), the Dutch Jesuit who was the "Second Apostle of Germany" — the figure most responsible, after Boniface, for holding the Catholic faith in German-speaking Europe during the Reformation. Born at Nijmegen in the Netherlands on May 8, 1521, he entered the Society of Jesus in 1543 and became the first Jesuit to publish in Germany. His three Catechisms — the Summa Doctrinae Christianae (1555) and its shorter versions — went through more than 200 editions in his lifetime and were the chief instrument of Catholic catechesis in Germany for two centuries. He founded universities and seminaries at Cologne, Vienna, Ingolstadt, Prague, and Fribourg.

He died on December 21, 1597, at Fribourg in Switzerland, where his relics are enshrined in the Church of St. Nicholas. He was canonized and declared a Doctor of the Church by Pius XI in 1925. He is patron of Germany and of the Catholic press. Cologne, where he spent many years teaching and where his catechisms were published, and Vienna, where he served as court preacher and university rector, are the German-speaking pilgrimage destinations associated with him.