op proper november
NOVEMBER 03, NOVEMBER Saint Martin de Porres At Lima, in Peru, Saint Martin de Porres, friar of the Order of Preachers. Saint Martin de Porres was born in Lima, Peru in 1579, the son of a Spanish nobleman and a black freedwoman from Panama. At first the father abandoned his little family and Martin’s earliest years were spent in dire poverty. Later, his father’s conscience smote him and taking the two children to himself, gave them at least the rudiments of an education. As a boy was apprenticed to a barber –surgeon to learn from him the unlikely combination of skills expected in those days of a man who wielded a straight razor. Thus he was launched on his life long career of healing and solacing which would embrace all the sick who came his way. Martin was received as a servant at the priory of the Holy Rosary in Lima. In this capacity, he gave himself to the lowliest duties in the house. It was only after several years that, seeing his evident good will and holiness, his superio