Saint Matthew
Apostle and Evangelist
- Feast Day
- September 21
- Born
- Galilee
Saint Matthew, called Levi son of Alphaeus in the Gospels of Mark and Luke, was a tax collector (publicanus) in the customs station at Capernaum on the Sea of Galilee, an occupation despised by Jewish society for its collaboration with Roman authority. The Gospel of Matthew records his call: As Jesus passed on from there, he saw a man named Matthew sitting at the customs post. He said to him, Follow me. And he got up and followed him (Matthew 9:9).
The apostolic catalogues of the Synoptics and Acts list him among the Twelve. Ancient tradition, attested already in the second-century testimony of Papias of Hierapolis preserved by Eusebius, attributes to him the first Gospel, written for a Jewish-Christian audience, with its insistence on Jesus as the fulfillment of the Law and the Prophets and its arrangement of Christ's teaching into five great discourses paralleling the five books of Moses.
The New Testament records nothing further of Matthew after Pentecost. Patristic tradition (Eusebius, Saint Clement of Alexandria, Saint Jerome) holds that he preached for some years to the Jews in Palestine before going abroad, with various traditions sending him to Ethiopia, Persia, Macedonia or Parthia. He is generally counted a martyr, though the manner of his death is uncertain.
The Feast of Saint Matthew, observed in red as for an apostle, celebrates the calling of a sinner to be an evangelist. As Pope Saint Bede the Venerable noted in a homily read at Matins on this day, Christ saw the publican; and because he saw him with the eye of mercy and chose him, he said to him: Follow me. The conversion of Matthew is paradigmatic of the Christian vocation as a response to the look of mercy.
Patronages
accountants · bankers · tax collectors · customs officers
From Saint Matthew
"Mercy I desire, not sacrifice. I did not come to call the righteous but sinners."
Catholic Churches Named After Saint Matthew
20 parishes on Catholic Church Times share Saint Matthew's name. Find their Mass times, confession schedules, and adoration hours:
- St. Matthew Parish — Aloran, MISAMIS OCCIDENTAL
- St. Matthew Parish — San Mateo, ISABELA
- St. Matthew's (Bishopbriggs) — Bishopbriggs, SCT
- St Matthews Parish — Narrogin, WA
- St Matthew's Parish, Crows Nest — Crows Nest, QLD
- St Matthew’s, Birdwood — Birdwood, SA
- St Matthew's Church — Yackandandah, VIC
- St Matthew, Bridgewater — Bridgewater, SA
- St Matthew - Bradford — Bradford, ENG
- St Matthew's, Auchtermuchty — Auchtermuchty, SCOTLAND
- St. Matthew's Church (Holy Spirit Parish) — Grand Bay-Westfield, NB
- St. Matthew Church — Osceola, AR
- St. Matthew — Mobile, AL
- St. Matthew Catholic Church — Detroit, MI
- St. Matthew — Wilmington, DE
- St. Matthew — Topeka, KS
- St. Matthew — Vernon Center, MN
- St Matthew Catholic Church — Cedar Rapids, IA
- Saint Matthew Catholic Church — Morning View, KY
- Saint Matthew Church — Norwalk, CT
Sources