Blessed Eustochium is a somewhat tragic figure, whose life was marked with suffering, but who seems to have borne all of her mental and physical distress with great love for Christ.

Eustochium was born in the year 1433 in Padua, Italy. She was the illegitimate daughter of a nun who had broken her vows. The sister bore Eustochium in her convent, where Eustochium could have lived her days in peace in a supportive environment.

The bishop, however, caught wind of the scandal, and reorganized the convent, presumably separating Eustochium’s mother from her. Eustochium, whose baptismal name was Lucrezia, remained at the convent and attended the school for girls there.

Eventually, Lucrezia desired to enter the convent and join the order of sisters. Many of the sisters objected, out of distaste for her origins, but the bishop was on Lucrezia’s side and she entered the convent a few years after her twentieth birthday. She took the name Eustochium, which was the name of an early Church Father, one of the disciples of St. Jerome.

During her short time as a sister, Eustochium experienced grave mental distress and the sisters were afraid of her wild outbursts of temper, mixed with her periods of melancholy. Eustochium cut herself with knives, which frightened the sisters, and they believed that she was possessed by a demon. They punished her in a manner which only hurt her more, and the bishop imprisoned her in a dungeon for three months. The townspeople wanted to burn her as a witch. Eustochium, however, clung to her desire to be a sister. She did not abandon her vocation. After four grueling years, she received her final vows. But the intense mental and physical distress weakened her health a great deal and she died on February 13, 1459.

Three years after her burial, her body was discovered to be incorrupt, and the bishop of Padua ordered a biography written and her body moved to a place of greater honor. Blessed Eustochium has been honored in Padua ever since. Let us pray to her to intercede particularly for those who are unwanted and for those who feel the afflictions of mental illness, depression, and loneliness.

Blessed Eustochium of Padua, young nun who bore terrible mental illness—pray for us!