Super Saints

Comparing the saints to superheroes may seem initially strange, but I believe it allows us as “modern” readers to grasp the role that the saints played in medieval Christianity. To start, it is important to really understand superheroes. Most of the interesting (and the most popular) superheroes began their lives as ordinary men, sometimes even coming up short of ordinary and qualifying as some kind of loser. Peter Parker is a science geek before he gets bitten by a radioactive spider, gets super powers, chooses not to stop a crime that later on results in the death of his uncle, and ultimately because of this becomes Spiderman. Bruce Wayne is born into a wealthy family, and it is the witnessing of his parents murder that sets him on the path to become Batman. Finally, Steve Rogers, a frail youth who is constantly deemed too scrawny to serve in the Army, proves he is worthy to be Captain America when he jumps on a grenade that he believes is live.  Each of these men could very easily not be superheroes, but when placed in challenging situations, they choose to rise above the situation and do the right thing. They reveal their inner worth, even if they are physically weak like Rogers or have made incorrect moral decisions in the past like Parker.

Consider now some of the Saints. Mary Magdalene is born into wealth and “gave herself totally to the pleasures of the flesh” (de Voragine, 375).  She is “guided by the divine will” (de Voragine, 375) to the house of Simon the Leper, where there she washes Christ’s feet with her tears and dries them with her hair. It is important that God guides Mary to the house, yet Mary seems to be the one choosing to do the washing. She thus mirrors the superheroes - she, not just an ordinary woman but a sinner, is placed in a situation by external forces, yet once there, she chooses to do the right thing, and is ultimately rewarded for it. Saint Catherine’s story is similar - she begins life as the well educated daughter of a king, and she goes to debate Emperor Maxentius as a regular woman. It is only after this debate, after she remains faithful to Christ, that He favors her and we can really see her saintly nature (de Voragine, 334 - 338). What is important here, like with Mary’s story, is that Catherine chooses to be virtuous when tested, and it is this choosing that propels her from the ordinary to the extraordinary.

The next two points of comparison between the saints and superheroes can be quickly summarized for the heroes. The heroes have powers (duh) and they also are both similar and different - they’re all strong, they love order and justice and truth, and they fight crime wearing spandex suits. Of course, the suits are different colors, their relationships with the law and the State are different, and their powers are different, but there are underlying baseline similarities that unite the heroes. Upon realizing this, I had an easier time accepting the similarities and differences of the saints - Batman and Captain America seem very different to me, but to someone born under a rock (or living in the middle ages) they would probably seem to be pretty similar. 

The saints are powerful. I didn’t realize this at first, and that was one of the reasons I put my hand up when Professor Brown asked us if we would want to be superheroes and put it back down when she asked us if we wanted to be saints. They are honored with militant imagery evoking their power: Saint Anselm describes Saint Stephen as “Holy Stephen…mighty soldier of God, first of the blessed army of the martyrs of God, powerful prince, one of the great lords of Heaven” (Anselm, 174) and Jacobius de Voragine writes “Saint James appeared to him in knightly array, comforted him” (de Voragine, 7). These saints have real power - as friends of God they can act as intercessors - “In love and assurance I send you as my intercessor, that you may make peace between me and your powerful friend, the Lord and Creator of both you and me” (Anselm, 174) and they can also protect individuals - “demons laid hold of me and carried me off toward Rome; but lo and behold, Saint James came riding after us and roundly upbraided the evil spirits for lying to me. When the demons kept arguing, Saint James herded all of us to a nearby window where the Blessed Virgin sat in conversation with a large number of Saints” (de Voragine, 8). Growing up “Christian” in modern America (by “Christian” I mean I go to church on Christmas eve and said grace when at my Grandparents home), I didn’t know much about the saints and didn’t appreciate their power to relate to God. This power is important when comparing them to superheroes, for power is one of the first things people think of when thinking of these heroes. 

The final point, that the Saints are similar and different, is pretty obvious: the similarities arise from basically everything I have laid out here (and more), and the differences can be seen in Professor Brown’s article - “although every soul experiences the fullness of God’s love, no two souls experience this fullness in exactly the same way. In saying to God ‘I am you’… each of the saints reveals God’s love refracted through the lens of his or her particular ‘I’” (Brown, 124). The saints are different, and they thus experience God’s love in different ways.

Up till now, I’ve laid out reasons why the saints and superheroes are similar: their power, their ordinariness before they choose to be good, and their dualistic internal similarities and differences. Now, having done that, I can use what I know about superheroes to talk about saints. For example, superheroes are role models - they are honest, brave, and uphold The American Way. Kids, whether consciously or not, see this; if you doubt me, go outside on Halloween. Indeed, kids will also choose a specific hero that they can relate to to “worship”, similar to how certain people relate better to certain saints. Saints, then should be looked at as cultural icons and role models whose stories teach people how to be good Christians. They may be intercessors to God, they may defend the weak, but, in my opinion, their greatest role is to teach the idea “I once was like you, ordinary and maybe sinful. But I chose to love God and stay faithful to Him, and because of that choice, I am His friend.”

Yet ultimately there is something about the saints that is special to them and sets them apart from superheroes: they are all human. Some might be rich, some poor, but none are gods (Thor), products of scientific experimentation (Captain America), or aliens (Superman). Indeed, even the wealthy saints, like Catherine or Mary Magdalene, are not saints because of their wealth, which sets them apart from some of the “vanilla” superheroes who don’t have supernatural powers - Tony Stark needs his money to be Iron Man in the same way Bruce Wayne needs his money to be Batman. Literally anyone can be a saint, even a great sinner like Mary. This, then, is their true greatness - they are not only role models who show the path to God, they are accessible role models. Imagine telling a little boy he could actually be Superman if only he was good. Imagine how excited he would be. And that, I think, is the reason people pray to Saints and make art of them.

JW

References 

Jacobus de Voragine, Golden Legend: Readings on the Saints, trans. William Granger Ryan, 2 vols. (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1993), 

Anselm of Canterbury, Prayers nos. 8-16, trans. Ward 

Rachel Fulton Brown, “Anselm and Praying with the Saints,” in Experiments in Empathy: The Middle Ages, ed. Karl Morrison and Rudolph M. Bell (Turnholt: Brepols, 2013).