FREE! Click here to Join FunTrivia. Thousands of games, quizzes, and lots more!
Quiz about Saintly Patronage
Quiz about Saintly Patronage

Saintly Patronage Trivia Quiz


The concept of "patronage", asking someone with clout to act on your behalf with higher-ups is nearly universal. Patron saints fulfill this need when dealing with the Ultimate Higher-up. Can you identify these ten?

A multiple-choice quiz by Jdeanflpa. Estimated time: 5 mins.
  1. Home
  2. »
  3. Quizzes
  4. »
  5. Religion Trivia
  6. »
  7. Christian People / Saints
  8. »
  9. Patron Saints

Author
Jdeanflpa
Time
5 mins
Type
Multiple Choice
Quiz #
393,620
Updated
Dec 03 21
# Qns
10
Difficulty
Easy
Avg Score
8 / 10
Plays
318
Last 3 plays: Guest 73 (10/10), hellobion (10/10), Guest 162 (7/10).
- -
Question 1 of 10
1. The United States of America shares its principal patron saint with hundreds of countries, cities, organizations and even religious concepts. She is regarded as uniquely placed as an intercessor, due to family ties. Can you name her? Hint


Question 2 of 10
2. Even atheistic nations can have a patron saint. The People's Republic of China has been officially atheist since 1949. Yet the most popular of all patron saints has been assigned, with a local title. Elsewhere she has been described in countless ways, one famous way being "a woman robed in the sun". Can you identify the Lady who is China's primary patron saint? Hint


Question 3 of 10
3. "The Island of Saints and Scholars", Ireland, has had plenty of both, and is graced with not one but three patron saints. Interestingly, all three are venerated by both Catholics and Anglicans on this island often bloodied by religious conflict. Lesser known are Saints Brigid and Columba, but almost everyone knows who Ireland's primary patron saint is. Do you? Hint


Question 4 of 10
4. Given France's long association with Roman Catholicism, it's unsurprising that the nation has multiple patron saints. The primary patron is the Virgin Mary (as Our Lady of the Assumption), which was confirmed in 1920 when another virgin was given precedence over the remaining patron saints. What indomitable young woman, framed and burned as a heretic, was not only exonerated but made France's second ranking patron saint? Hint


Question 5 of 10
5. He is one of the more popular patron saints, despite how little is actually known about him. Born in the Levant (at least three locations are claimed) of Grecian descent, he became a Roman soldier, then a Christian, and in 303 a martyr, for refusing to make appropriate sacrifices to the official deities. He has his own cross, started being called a dragonslayer in the 11th Century, and became England's patron saint. Who is our man of mystery history? Hint


Question 6 of 10
6. Italy is favored with a pair of patron saints of great renown. One is the much loved St. Francis of Assisi, who also looks after San Francisco, California, the environment, and the Cub Scouts. Italy's other patron saint is a remarkable, largely self-educated woman who became a nun, Scholastic theologian (one of two women recognized as a "Doctor of the Church", alongside St. Theresa of Avila), ambassador, philosopher and correspondent with Kings and Popes. The rooftops of her city are known for their distinctive brown color. Can you name this amazing lady who is also counted as a patron saint for all Europe? Hint


Question 7 of 10
7. Not all of the patronage of saints is attached to places. Sometimes a saint covers a wide range of people, places, things, even concepts. One man is patron saint to eight countries (Canada among them), of fathers, carpenters, travellers, and of the Roman Catholic Church's concept of a "happy death". In 1870, Pope Pius IX proclaimed him the patron saint of the entire Roman Catholic Church. With all these patronage titles he stands close to the Virgin Mary, appropriately enough. Who is this great patron saint? Hint


Question 8 of 10
8. What's in a name? Most saints get by with one or two names. One of the original twelve Apostles was not so lucky, since his given name was the same as Iscariot's. Perhaps it's appropriate that he became the patron saint of lost causes and those in desperate peril. Given those patronages, it was natural that he became the patron saint of hospitals, too. Notably, a famous children's cancer hospital was founded under the saint's name by entertainer Danny Thomas in Memphis, Tennessee. Who is our saint with a name issue? Hint


Question 9 of 10
9. You might think that being a levitating monk would be well received in the Catholic Church. Not so much. Poor Joseph of Cupertino spent much of his life being shipped from monastery to monastery, while required to live in isolation. He was even sent before the Inquisition. He was found blameless, and on 21 October 1638 he levitated before the Inquisition tribunal. Pope Urban VIII also saw Joseph airborne. Even with the quality witnesses, it took over 110 years for him to be canonized. What professions would you think would be within the patronage of a floating friar like St. Joseph of Cupertino? Hint


Question 10 of 10
10. You wouldn't likely expect that the patron saint of the internet would have lived in the 7th Century, but that is when St. Isidore of Seville flourished. Since St. Isidore died some 1330 years before the first ARPANET connection you might ask why Pope St. John Paul II made the declaration in 1997. It has to do with a similarity between St. Isidore's great work and that of the internet. What do you think it was? Hint



(Optional) Create a Free FunTrivia ID to save the points you are about to earn:

arrow Select a User ID:
arrow Choose a Password:
arrow Your Email:




Most Recent Scores
Nov 11 2024 : Guest 73: 10/10
Nov 10 2024 : hellobion: 10/10
Nov 01 2024 : Guest 162: 7/10

Quiz Answer Key and Fun Facts
1. The United States of America shares its principal patron saint with hundreds of countries, cities, organizations and even religious concepts. She is regarded as uniquely placed as an intercessor, due to family ties. Can you name her?

Answer: Virgin Mary (Our Lady of the Immaculate Conception)

If you need something from the Big Boss, who better to ask for you than his mother. The Virgin Mary is patron of more people, places, and things than I can count. Literally. I gave up at 350 patronages. The other three saintly women are also "Mothers", as in founders of religious orders. Each of them is also a patron saint: St. Elizabeth Seton is a patron for widows, St. Frances Cabrini for immigrants, and St.

Theodora Guerin, who was canonized rather recently, is patron of the Catholic Archdiocese of Indianapolis.
2. Even atheistic nations can have a patron saint. The People's Republic of China has been officially atheist since 1949. Yet the most popular of all patron saints has been assigned, with a local title. Elsewhere she has been described in countless ways, one famous way being "a woman robed in the sun". Can you identify the Lady who is China's primary patron saint?

Answer: Virgin Mary (as Our Lady of Sheshan)

Christianity has not had an easy time of it in China. The Catholics got there first in the early 1600s, but found that the initial welcome would change with every shift in government. It only took until 1648 for China to have its first martyr. The pattern of welcome followed by persecution went on for centuries.

The Roman Catholic Church habitually makes Mary the patron saint of important or troubled areas. China met both criteria. The other female saints listed are among the "120 Martyrs of China" canonized by St. Pope John Paul II in October, 2000. Saints Agnes and Agatha were killed during a suppression of Christianity in the 1850s.

The 14 year old St. Anna Wang was martyred during the Boxer Rebellion in 1900.
3. "The Island of Saints and Scholars", Ireland, has had plenty of both, and is graced with not one but three patron saints. Interestingly, all three are venerated by both Catholics and Anglicans on this island often bloodied by religious conflict. Lesser known are Saints Brigid and Columba, but almost everyone knows who Ireland's primary patron saint is. Do you?

Answer: St. Patrick

Born Maewyn Succat somewhere in Roman Britain, and suffering from a patchwork education, Patrick admitted that his Latin wasn't the best. But the young man's depth of faith and natural gravitas occasioned Pope Leo I (the Great) to call him "Patricius", meaning "noble born". Pope Leo also approved the mission to Ireland. Patricius became Padraig or Padraic in Gaelic, and Patrick in English.

In addition to Ireland, St. Patrick is patron to at least two other countries, five cities, three Roman Catholic Archdioceses, engineers and paralegals.

The other saints named are among the "12 Apostles of Ireland", the first group of preachers trained by St. Patrick.
4. Given France's long association with Roman Catholicism, it's unsurprising that the nation has multiple patron saints. The primary patron is the Virgin Mary (as Our Lady of the Assumption), which was confirmed in 1920 when another virgin was given precedence over the remaining patron saints. What indomitable young woman, framed and burned as a heretic, was not only exonerated but made France's second ranking patron saint?

Answer: St. Jeanne d'Arc

The general outline of the fate of Jeanne d'Arc (usually called Jaon of Arc in English) is known to anyone with an appreciation of European history. Some of the aftermath is interesting. After France was reunified it took only a few years for an appeal to be launched on Joan's behalf.

She was swiftly exonerated, and the bishop who had orchestrated her juridical murder was posthumously excommunicated. Causes for sainthood usually move very slowly, so the wait until 1920 is not a surprise. St. Joan's name is a bit of an issue.

Her family seems to have had an early surname of D'arc or T'arc. No place named Arc seems to have existed. St. Joan was from a village named Domremy. I have used d'Arc as her surname. St Marguerite was a missionary to New France. Stes. Catherine and Margaret, along with St. Michael were St. Joan's guiding voices.
5. He is one of the more popular patron saints, despite how little is actually known about him. Born in the Levant (at least three locations are claimed) of Grecian descent, he became a Roman soldier, then a Christian, and in 303 a martyr, for refusing to make appropriate sacrifices to the official deities. He has his own cross, started being called a dragonslayer in the 11th Century, and became England's patron saint. Who is our man of mystery history?

Answer: St. George

St. George is the patron of a fair number of countries in addition to England, of some 13 cities, and innumerable institutions. "Pious legends" have a way of attaching themselves to figures with incomplete biographies, so the addition of dragon removal to the curriculum vitae of a popular saint is not a surprise. St. Augustine of Canterbury has been called "the Apostle to the English", basically the same story as what St. Patrick did one island west a little bit later. St. Michael is the ultimate subduer of dragons. St. David belongs to the Welsh, he is their patron saint.
6. Italy is favored with a pair of patron saints of great renown. One is the much loved St. Francis of Assisi, who also looks after San Francisco, California, the environment, and the Cub Scouts. Italy's other patron saint is a remarkable, largely self-educated woman who became a nun, Scholastic theologian (one of two women recognized as a "Doctor of the Church", alongside St. Theresa of Avila), ambassador, philosopher and correspondent with Kings and Popes. The rooftops of her city are known for their distinctive brown color. Can you name this amazing lady who is also counted as a patron saint for all Europe?

Answer: St. Catherine of Siena

The rooftops of Siena are colored by a natural pigment in the clay used in the shingles called "sienna" (technically burnt sienna, the raw stuff is yellow). The pigment was mined at Siena and sold across the known world. St. Catherine's major surviving work is "The Dialogue of Divine Providence".

The "Dialogo" is a rigorous read, but a simply stunning exploration of divine love in the conversation between a soul that "rises up" and the Almighty. As for our other saints, St. Lucy of Syracuse, you've heard of, she's the Santa Lucia of the Italian song. St. Margaret of Fontana was known for her care of the sick. St. Susanna was a fairly obscure early martyr, killed for refusing marriage to an Emperor's pagan relative.
7. Not all of the patronage of saints is attached to places. Sometimes a saint covers a wide range of people, places, things, even concepts. One man is patron saint to eight countries (Canada among them), of fathers, carpenters, travellers, and of the Roman Catholic Church's concept of a "happy death". In 1870, Pope Pius IX proclaimed him the patron saint of the entire Roman Catholic Church. With all these patronage titles he stands close to the Virgin Mary, appropriately enough. Who is this great patron saint?

Answer: St. Joseph

Venerated in Christian tradition as the husband of Mary and earthly foster father of Jesus, some of St. Joseph's admirers think he's underappreciated. My own suspicion is that as a member of a conquered and impoverished Royal house, the last thing St. Joseph ever wanted was attention.

There is also the question of how neglected one could be, as patron saint for more than 15% of the world's population. I had to stretch a little for names worthy to place alongside St. Joseph, so we wound up with the "Apostle to the Gentiles", St. Paul, the Defender of Heaven, St. Michael, and the patron saint of children, St. Nicholas.
8. What's in a name? Most saints get by with one or two names. One of the original twelve Apostles was not so lucky, since his given name was the same as Iscariot's. Perhaps it's appropriate that he became the patron saint of lost causes and those in desperate peril. Given those patronages, it was natural that he became the patron saint of hospitals, too. Notably, a famous children's cancer hospital was founded under the saint's name by entertainer Danny Thomas in Memphis, Tennessee. Who is our saint with a name issue?

Answer: St. Jude

Sometimes names are just popular. The original twelve Apostles had among them two Simons (the Zealot, and the one who became Peter), two Jameses (one the son of Zebedee, the other of Alphaeus) and two Judases. Stuck with the same first name as Judas Iscariot, Judas Thaddeus was neglected by much of western Christianity for a long time, despite the best efforts of the church hierarchy, and Biblical translators who rendered his name as either Jude or Thaddeus to try to avoid confusion. Happily the 20th Century brought renewed interest in a saint overlooked because of his name, helped somewhat by the fabulous work of St. Jude's Children's Hospital.

The other saints listed represent between three and five of the twelve Apostles, depending on how you are counting.
9. You might think that being a levitating monk would be well received in the Catholic Church. Not so much. Poor Joseph of Cupertino spent much of his life being shipped from monastery to monastery, while required to live in isolation. He was even sent before the Inquisition. He was found blameless, and on 21 October 1638 he levitated before the Inquisition tribunal. Pope Urban VIII also saw Joseph airborne. Even with the quality witnesses, it took over 110 years for him to be canonized. What professions would you think would be within the patronage of a floating friar like St. Joseph of Cupertino?

Answer: Astronauts and aviators

St. Joseph of Cupertino is officially the patron saint of aviators and astronauts. Interestingly for Funtrivia players, he is also the patron saint of those taking tests! I don't usually single source questions, but the bulk of the information I've given you on St. Joseph of Cupertino comes from a 2007 article in the "Arlington Catholic Herald" by Thomas Craughwell.
10. You wouldn't likely expect that the patron saint of the internet would have lived in the 7th Century, but that is when St. Isidore of Seville flourished. Since St. Isidore died some 1330 years before the first ARPANET connection you might ask why Pope St. John Paul II made the declaration in 1997. It has to do with a similarity between St. Isidore's great work and that of the internet. What do you think it was?

Answer: St. Isidore tried to collate all classical knowledge.

The 19th Century historian Charles Forbes Rene de Montalembert called St. Isidore of Seville, "the last scholar of the ancient world". As Archbishop of Seville in Visigothic Spain, St. Isidore grew alarmed at the loss of old documents and their attendant knowledge in a time of increasing illiteracy in the nobility.

His response was to compile the "Etymologae", an encylopedia of classic works, including extracts of many that would now be otherwise completely lost. The huge undertaking to preserve so much knowledge was naturally reminiscent of the internet's vast catalog of information.
Source: Author Jdeanflpa

This quiz was reviewed by FunTrivia editor looney_tunes before going online.
Any errors found in FunTrivia content are routinely corrected through our feedback system.
12/2/2024, Copyright 2024 FunTrivia, Inc. - Report an Error / Contact Us