St Lydwine (also called Lidwina, Lydwid, Lidwid, and Liduina of Schiedam) is a Dutch saint who suffered from chronic pain, likely multiple sclerosis.
Read the full St Lydwine novena on the novena page. You can also learn more about novenas here.
Who Was Saint Lydwine (Lidwina)?
St Lydwine (also called Lidwina, Lydwid, Lidwid, and Liduina of Schiedam) is a Dutch saint who suffered from chronic pain, likely multiple sclerosis. She was a mystic who had a fall while ice skating that led her to become disabled over time. She is the patron saint of sickness, chronic pain sufferers, chronically ill, ice skaters, and the town of Schiedam.
Lydwine was born in 1380 at Schiedam, Holland, and was one of nine children.
At age 15, she broke a rib on her right side while ice skating in the year 1396, and that led to her becoming disabled through her life.
God gave her private illuminations of Heaven, Purgatory, and hell, as well as of Christ and other supernatural realities. She fasted continuously and even during her life was recognized as having healing gifts from God.
Thomas a Kempis, who wrote the Imitation of Christ, wrote a biography of St Lidwina.
Her sufferings became serious and chronic, but Lydwine heroically accepted them as coming from God and united them to Christ’s sufferings, as reparation for the sins of the world.
Lydwine endured an abcess that burst in her chest, nausea and vomiting, fever and headaches, toothaches, and even blindness.
God also allowed her to suffer the stigmata.
Through these life-long sufferings, she grew in holiness and love of God, all the way to her death in 1433 at age 53.
St Lidwina was canonized on March 14th, 1890, by Pope Leo XIII.