Scandalously irreverent and theologically imprecise briefs on heroines of the faith, written by a recovering Protestant agnostic seeker with practically no training and exactly zero filter.
Holy incest, Batman! This saint’s story takes us for a wild ride, so buckle up.
Ok, so St. Dymphna was born in Ireland sometime in the 7th century. Wikipedia says her father was a “petty king”. I don’t know exactly what that means, but it sounds like something Drake would call Meek Mill during a rap battle and I’m here for it.
At 14, she decided to become a consecrated virgin, and then shortly after that her mother died. I don’t know if her mom was the one in charge of her dad’s meds or what, but he kind of went off the deep end after that. His underlings told him that he needed to remarry, so he searched all the land to find a woman as beautiful as his late wife, but couldn’t. Then he realized their daughter was basically her carbon copy, so why not marry her, right?
{Let’s all take an upchuck intermission here. Just one big collective barf break for how totally gross that is … even for a guy who calls himself a king. Real royals marry their cousins, you petty perv.}
Anyway, obviously Dymphna was all, “No thanks, DAD, hard pass,” because not only is that disgusting, but she already had CV on her CV, remember? So she grabbed a few friends, including a priest (Fr. Gerebern, who was martyred with her, according to legend, and became a saint himself), and they fled to a place in modern-day Belgium, called Geel … ‘cause shiz was gettin’ real… pops tryna coppin’ a feel… ‘cause he a petty king like MEEK Miiiiill.
See, told you it would work. Don’t worry, Drake, that one was on the house, but I’ll be invoicing for the next one.
Anyway, they make it to Geel and she decides to build a hospice for the sick and poor there. Which, can we just take a sec to acknowledge that she was only fifteen when she did this? Like, next time my kid asks me if she can build a YouTube following for her make-up tutorials I’m gonna say, “Or maybe instead you can build an entire home that caters to the marginalized and really makes a difference in the world?” Idk, maybe that’s too much pressure for 9th grade. Also, some of y’all do need help with those brows, so who am I to say which is more impactful?
Anyway, that’s when things went sideways for Dymphna. Evidently, some of the coins she was using in her hospice led to her father being able to trace her whereabouts. He sent some of his petty soldiers to find her. Did he also give them petty cash for road trip snacks? Idk. I have so many questions. I also like to picture them in tiny petticoats and riding on petty little ponies but only because it makes me smile.
Then, when they found Dymphna, her dad came to “retrieve” her and she had to shoot him down. Again. It’s one thing to be thirsty, but incest thirst is still a whole other level of nasty. And it was at this point that her petty pop drew his sword and cut off her head. Truly tragic.
Hundreds of years later however, they built a church honoring her in Geel and this part is really cool.
Because of her dad, she became the patron saint of those struggling with mental illness, so people started traveling from all over Europe to pray for healing there. Eventually, so many people came that the church couldn’t really contain them anymore, so members of the community started taking them in—not as patients, but as “guests” or “boarders” (NPR did a story on the town a while back) and they became members of the townspeople’s families. Some would just stay for a little while, but others would live their whole lives there.
As recently as 1930, over 4,000 boarders lived with families in Geel and worked as fully contributing members of the community. Which is really freakin’ beautiful.
Dymphna is usually depicted as holding a sword “awkwardly” since that’s how she died, which got me thinking: If I ever became Catholic and a saint, would my statues just be of my eyes bulging out while I choked on a gum ball, because watch me probably die in some stupid way like that.
But I digress.
In other depictions she’s holding the sword correctly and stabbing a demon to symbolize her other title of being a “Demon Slayer.” Which, I mean, like, eat you heart out, Buffy, because that’s hella cool. So, while her story is super sad and cringey, her short life led to a lot of good and maybe that was all just part of … wait for it … God’s Plan.
Y’all know I had to put at least one more Drake reference in there. Don’t worry, I’ll show myself out.
Destiny Herndon De La Rosa is the founder of the secular pro-life New Wave Feminists organization. She is a frequent op/ed contributor to the Dallas Morning News and a sought-after speaker.
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