The Catholic Church celebrates the feast day of Saint Josephine Bakhita on February 8.
She is a truly remarkable saint in Heaven!
If you’re unfamiliar with this saintly intercessor, you can find more information here.
Here are three timeless lessons we can learn from the life and legacy of Saint Josephine Bakhita:
1) The Transformative Power of Suffering
Oh, the power of suffering!
Saint Josephine Bakhita suffered a lot, both physically and emotionally.
She first endured the trauma of being kidnapped into slavery at the age of seven, then was resold multiple times. Saint Josephine Bakhita experienced horrendous abuse at the hands of her multiple “masters.”
As a Sudanese slave, a pattern was cut into her skin across her torso, chest, and arms with a razor. Then, salt was poured into her open wounds. This left her body covered with deep scars. These scars served as a reminder of her trauma even after she was freed.
These experiences left Josephine Bakhita with an acute awareness of her human frailty and need for dependence on God.
At her baptism, she took the name “Josephine," but also kept the name given to her by her captors. It was almost as if she wanted a constant reminder of how far she had come.
Saint Josephine Bakhita’s example shows us that our struggles, hardships, and even trauma can serve a greater purpose!
2) Gratitude
It’s easy to practice gratitude when things are going well. When everyone around us behaves in a way pleasing to us, and when the burden of modern-day living is light.
However, Saint Josephine Bakhita shows us that it is even more important to maintain an attitude of gratitude when things are not going according to plan.
As a result of the trauma Saint Josephine Bakhita experienced at such a young age, she couldn’t even remember the name her parents gave her at birth. Her new owners named her “Bakhita” which means “fortunate." This may have been done in a malicious way seeing that she was not fortunate in her slavery, but she truly adopted a spirit of gratitude throughout her life.
When she was sold to an Italian diplomat, she was relocated to Italy. It was there that she encountered Jesus for the first time. For this, she often expressed gratitude for every part of her life–including her past!
She truly saw God’s hand in everything.
3) Forgiveness
Similar to Jesus forgiving his persecutors on the cross at His crucifixion, Saint Josephine Bakhita forgave those who brutally abused her throughout her life as a slave.
Josephine Bakhita spoke of her captors with this spirit of forgiveness, saying, “…poor people, they didn’t know how much they hurt me: they were the masters, I was the slave. Just as we are used to doing good things, similarly, those slavers did such things because it was their habit, not for wickedness!” And, “…I would kneel down and kiss their hands because, if it had never happened, I would not be Christian and a consecrated woman.”