Saint Birgitta of Sweden the 12-year Prayer to get 3 into Heaven
Saint Birgitta of Sweden was born in 1304 and died on 23 July 1374. She was a Swedish Catholic mystic and the founder of the Bridgettines. Saint Birgitta had many visions of Jesus, mostly about his passion, and he told her to say a prayer for 12 years and promised that praying would get 3 people into heaven. Saint Birgitta is one of the six patron saints of Europe and is probably the most famous saint of Sweden. Saint Birgitta was canonized in the year 1391 by Pope Boniface IX. Because of new discussions about her works, the Council of Basel confirmed the orthodoxy of her revelations in 1436. Have you ever heard of her or her prayer?
Saint Birgitta Biography
The most important thing about Saint Birgitta is the visions she had of Jesus, who spoke to her from an early age. For example, at the age of ten, she had a vision of Jesus hanging on the cross. When she asked who had treated him like this, he answered: They who despise me, and spurn my love for them. The Passion of Christ became the center of her spiritual life from that moment on.
In another vision, she described a vision that included the infant Jesus lying on clean swaddling clothes on the ground, and emitting light himself, and she described the Blessed Virgin Mary as blonde-haired and kneeling in prayer exactly as she was moments before the spontaneous birth, with her womb shrunken and her virginity intact.
Amazingly, she predicted an eventual Vatican State, foretelling almost the exact boundaries delineated by Mussolini for Vatican City in 1921. Pope Benedict XVI spoke of Saint Birgitta in a general audience on October 27, 2010, stating that the value of her revelations, and saying, “which recognized Bridget’s holiness without ever pronouncing on her revelations, has accepted the overall authenticity of her interior experience.”
In another amazing revelation, Saint Birgitta prayed for a long time to know how many blows Jesus Christ suffered during the Passion. Jesus was said to have responded to her by appearing to her and stating that “I received 5480 blows upon My Body. If you wish to honor them in some way, recite fifteen Our Fathers and fifteen Hail Marys with the following Prayers, which I shall teach you, for an entire year. When the year is finished, you will have honored each of My Wounds.”
The Brigitta Chapel was erected in 1651 in Vienna, and in 1900, the new district of Brigittenau was founded. In Sweden, adjacent to Skederid Church, built by Saint Birgitta’s father on the family’s land, a memorial stone was erected in 1930. She was named the patron saint of Europe on October 1, 2000, by Pope John Paul II.
The founder of Protestantism was a big critic of her. He stated his revelations were ravings. You can decide for yourself; all of her revelations have been published.
Saint Birgitta’s Revelaciones were written in Latin, and appeared in critical editions during the years 1956 to 2002 under the aegis of the Royal Academy of Letters, History and Antiquities, Stockholm. English translations are:
The Revelations of Saint Birgitta of Sweden, translated by Denis Searby, with introductions and notes by Bridget Morris, 4 vols. (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2006–2015) [Volume 1 has Books I–III; Volume II has Books IV–V; Volume III has Books VI-VII; Volume IV has Book VIII]
Birgitta of Sweden, Life and selected revelations, edited, with a preface by Marguerite Tjader Harris; translation and notes by Albert Ryle Kezel; introduction by Tore Nyberg, (New York: Paulist Press, 1990) [Includes translations of The life of Blessed Birgitta by Prior Peter and Master Peter, and Books 5 and 7 of Revelations, and the Four prayers from the Revelations.] Saint Bride and her book: Birgitta of Sweden’s revelations, translated from Middle English, introduction by Julia Bolton Holloway, (1992) Arne Jönsson, St. Bridget’s Revelations to the Popes: an edition of the so-called Tractatus de summis pontificibus.
Conclusion
Saint Birgitta of Sweden, a fourteenth-century saint from Sweden, had visions of Jesus her entire life, starting at age ten. She was controversial, but because she heard directly from Jesus, she is worthy of study. It is good that her revelations are written down and translated into English. So, they are available for everyone.
