Saint Thecla

Today is the feast day of Saint Thecla. She is thought to have lived in the first century of the church and was engaged to be married. She heard St. Paul's discourse on virginity and decided to follow him. There are stories of her being saved from being martyred by miraculous events including by rain when an attempt was made to burn her at the stake. Saint Thecla spent her days following St. Paul on his apostolic journeys also preaching the good news herself.

Recently, the oldest known fresco of St. Paul, dating to the 4th century, was found in the Catacomb of St. Thecla in Rome.

About the painting above ...

It is called "Saint Thecla Praying for the Plague-Stricken" and was painted around 1758 by Giovanni Battista Tiepolo.

This is a preliminary sketch for one of Tiepolo's greatest religious works, the 22 foot-high canvas in the apse of the cathedral at Este, near Padua. Commissioned in 1758 and installed on Christmas day, 1759, the picture commemorates the plague of 1630 when the townspeople of Este prayed for the intercession of Saint Thecla. The first-century saint is shown among victims of the plague, praying to God; the town in the background is Este.