A Novena to Saint Cajetan
Pan y trabajo
Bread and Work
The Novena Prayer
Glorious Saint Cajetan, acclaimed by all people to be the father of providence because you provide miraculous aid to all who come to you in need, I stand before you today humbly asking that you present to the Lord the requests that I confidently deposit in your hands. May these graces that I now request help me to always seek the Kingdom of God and his righteousness, knowing that God, who dresses with beauty the flowers of the field and abundantly feeds the birds of the sky, will grant me all else besides.
On his feast in Buenos Aires, the queue outside his shrine at Liniers has run for blocks for nearly a century, and the banners carried in it read simply paz, pan y trabajo: peace, bread and work.
The Lawyer Who Started Late
The Novena Prayer
Glorious Saint Cajetan, acclaimed by all people to be the father of providence because you provide miraculous aid to all who come to you in need, I stand before you today humbly asking that you present to the Lord the requests that I confidently deposit in your hands. May these graces that I now request help me to always seek the Kingdom of God and his righteousness, knowing that God, who dresses with beauty the flowers of the field and abundantly feeds the birds of the sky, will grant me all else besides.
Cajetan took a doctorate in both civil and canon law at Padua in 1504 and worked for several years in the papal civil service before being ordained a priest in 1516, at thirty-six.
Reform Begins With the Reformer
The Novena Prayer
Glorious Saint Cajetan, acclaimed by all people to be the father of providence because you provide miraculous aid to all who come to you in need, I stand before you today humbly asking that you present to the Lord the requests that I confidently deposit in your hands. May these graces that I now request help me to always seek the Kingdom of God and his righteousness, knowing that God, who dresses with beauty the flowers of the field and abundantly feeds the birds of the sky, will grant me all else besides.
In 1524, Cajetan co-founded the Theatines with Gian Pietro Carafa, a company of priests bound to live a common, reformed life; Carafa was later elected pope as Paul IV.
Without a Safety Net
The Novena Prayer
Glorious Saint Cajetan, acclaimed by all people to be the father of providence because you provide miraculous aid to all who come to you in need, I stand before you today humbly asking that you present to the Lord the requests that I confidently deposit in your hands. May these graces that I now request help me to always seek the Kingdom of God and his righteousness, knowing that God, who dresses with beauty the flowers of the field and abundantly feeds the birds of the sky, will grant me all else besides.
The Theatines took no fixed income and, unlike the older mendicant orders, did not beg either; members were to work and accept only what came unasked, a practice that gave Cajetan his later title, father of Providence.
Against the Money-Lenders
The Novena Prayer
Glorious Saint Cajetan, acclaimed by all people to be the father of providence because you provide miraculous aid to all who come to you in need, I stand before you today humbly asking that you present to the Lord the requests that I confidently deposit in your hands. May these graces that I now request help me to always seek the Kingdom of God and his righteousness, knowing that God, who dresses with beauty the flowers of the field and abundantly feeds the birds of the sky, will grant me all else besides.
Cajetan promoted the Monte di Pieta at Naples, a charitable pawnshop that lent against pledges at little or no interest to undercut predatory money-lenders; it is generally reckoned an ancestor of the modern Banco di Napoli.
The Incurables
The Novena Prayer
Glorious Saint Cajetan, acclaimed by all people to be the father of providence because you provide miraculous aid to all who come to you in need, I stand before you today humbly asking that you present to the Lord the requests that I confidently deposit in your hands. May these graces that I now request help me to always seek the Kingdom of God and his righteousness, knowing that God, who dresses with beauty the flowers of the field and abundantly feeds the birds of the sky, will grant me all else besides.
Cajetan worked directly in hospitals for incurables in both Venice and Naples, wards for patients whose conditions offered no prospect of recovery.
A Slow Canonization
The Novena Prayer
Glorious Saint Cajetan, acclaimed by all people to be the father of providence because you provide miraculous aid to all who come to you in need, I stand before you today humbly asking that you present to the Lord the requests that I confidently deposit in your hands. May these graces that I now request help me to always seek the Kingdom of God and his righteousness, knowing that God, who dresses with beauty the flowers of the field and abundantly feeds the birds of the sky, will grant me all else besides.
Cajetan was beatified in 1629 by Pope Urban VIII and canonized on 12 April 1671 by Pope Clement X, a hundred and twenty-four years after his death.
Waiting
The Novena Prayer
Glorious Saint Cajetan, acclaimed by all people to be the father of providence because you provide miraculous aid to all who come to you in need, I stand before you today humbly asking that you present to the Lord the requests that I confidently deposit in your hands. May these graces that I now request help me to always seek the Kingdom of God and his righteousness, knowing that God, who dresses with beauty the flowers of the field and abundantly feeds the birds of the sky, will grant me all else besides.
The specific devotion of pan y trabajo, bread and work, and Cajetan's association with the unemployed, developed among Italian immigrant communities in Argentina in the early twentieth century, particularly during periods of high unemployment, and has remained concentrated there ever since.
The Seventh of August
The Novena Prayer
Glorious Saint Cajetan, acclaimed by all people to be the father of providence because you provide miraculous aid to all who come to you in need, I stand before you today humbly asking that you present to the Lord the requests that I confidently deposit in your hands. May these graces that I now request help me to always seek the Kingdom of God and his righteousness, knowing that God, who dresses with beauty the flowers of the field and abundantly feeds the birds of the sky, will grant me all else besides.
Cajetan died in Naples in 1547, during a period of political violence in the city; according to those present he refused a mattress at the end and asked to be laid on bare boards.
The prayer above is a traditional novena prayer to Saint Cajetan, of unknown authorship and long in circulation, given here as it is commonly printed. Gaetano dei Conti di Thiene, 1480–1547: doctor of both laws at Padua, ordained at thirty-six, co-founder in 1524 of the Theatines with Gian Pietro Carafa — later Paul IV. He promoted the Monte di Pietà at Naples, a charitable pawnshop founded to undercut the money-lenders and generally reckoned an ancestor of the Banco di Napoli. Canonised 1671. The devotion of pan y trabajo is Argentine: on 7 August the queue at his shrine in Liniers, Buenos Aires, runs for blocks. What follows each day is a fact from his life or from the devotion's history, one per day.
