SALVATION OF A SHIPWRECKED MAN

Year 390, Italy

In the early centuries of the Church, the faithful were permitted, when undertaking a dangerous journey, to carry the Holy Eucharist with them.

On one occasion, Satyrus, the brother of the great bishop Ambrose, embarked in Italy bound for the solitary shores of Africa. The ship glided over the surface of the sea when suddenly the breeze died down, followed by a calm that foretold a great storm. The clear and transparent sky began to grow increasingly clouded, and the continuous flashes of lightning foretold the brewing of a threatening tempest.

The leaden cloud of the storm grew in size and closed off the horizon until, passing through the zenith, it burst as if the explosive fire of a volcano were imprisoned in its depths.

The sea itself, which had been a transparent mirror faithfully reflecting the clarity and serenity of the sky, now appeared murky and raging, its foaming waves sweeping over the deck of the ship, which seemed doomed to be swallowed by the abyss.

In such a colossal struggle, the vessel was falling apart by the moment. Realizing the imminent danger, Satyrus did not wish to die deprived of the Holy Mystery. He hurried to his fellow Christian travelers, begging them to allow him to carry the Divine Pledge, the object of his greatest consolation.

Although, as a catechumen, he was not even permitted to see the Holy Eucharist, his repeated pleas finally gained him the longed-for grace of carrying It against his chest, wrapped in a fine white linen cloth.

Upon possessing the Treasure of Heaven, Satyrus considered himself happy and blessed, all the more as he felt in his soul an unshakable confidence in the power of the Sacrament. So much so that, at the very moment of the shipwreck, he threw himself into the sea and, without aid from any wreckage to which the other passengers clung desperately, experienced the manifest miracle of walking upon the waters as if he were on solid ground. He was the first to reach the hospitable shores of Sardinia.

Convinced that the Most Blessed Sacrament had miraculously saved him, Satyrus believed that even greater graces awaited him when he would receive It into his heart, and he resolved to receive Holy Baptism as soon as possible.

Saint Ambrose recounted this prodigy in the funeral oration he delivered in Milan during the solemn funeral rites of his late brother, Saint Satyrus.

The Church honors his memory on September 17.

(Rohrbacher, Universal History of the Church, Book 36.)