St. Peter Claver was born in 1580 in Verdú, Spain, and died in 1654 in Cartagena, Colombia, but the patron saint of slavery’s work carries weight in today’s life, too.

Catholics recently celebrated St. Peter Claver’s feast day, with the Archdiocese of Los Angeles tweeting, “St. Peter Claver baptized and taught the faith to over 300,000 slaves over a period of 40 years.” 

He earned the title “apostle of the Negroes” after his missionary work in Cartagena where he saw the horrors of the slave trade and dedicated himself to helping those enslaved, according to Britannica. 

He spread the Catholic faith while taking care of the sick and keeping company with the slaves in Colombia. Britannica says it is estimated that he converted and baptized more than 300,000 slaves. St. Peter Claver was canonized by Pope Leo XIII in 1888 and was declared the “patron of all Roman Catholic missions to African peoples.” 

Jesuits.org recounts St. Peter Claver’s life as a missionary to slaves. In the 17th century, many European colonists participated in the slave trade, despite Pope Paul III’s condemnation of it. The Jesuits admit that members of their order enslaved many during St. Peter Claver’s time, a period they now call a “deeply regretful chapter” in the order’s history.

Jesuits.org also reports that St. Peter Claver said, “We must speak to them with our hands before we try to speak to them with our lips,” about his work with slaves. His humility and dedication to the less fortunate allowed him to possess miraculous abilities, including healing the sick as Christ did. 

John Grondelski, in an article for the National Catholic Register, notes how St. Peter Claver serves as an example of perseverance while the Church and the state battled over the issues of slavery.

“It would still take three centuries for much of the world to recognize the incongruity between human dignity and slavery, something Claver already knew,” Grondelski writes. “And slavery continues, in various forms under different names, today. Our own society, too, can be blind to its moral failings: I am certain there will be a day when people look back on the 20th and 21st centuries to ask, ‘How could they believe killing their unborn babies was a ‘human right?’ Perhaps we still have something to learn from Peter Claver: about persistence in our time and patience in God’s.” 

Phoenix’s former Bishop Emeritus Thomas Olmsted celebrated a Mass for St. Peter Claver last year, in which he praised African-American Catholics in the diocese. 

“It was a powerful message; about unity; all Catholics being welcomed into a Christian society. It reminded me there is a small percentage of Black Catholics in Phoenix, yet a good shepherd is responsible for all his sheep,” James K. Ellis, supreme knight of the Knights of Peter Claver, a Catholic group in Phoenix, said in a Catholic Sun report.