The reason given in the decree is worth having in front of you before the prayers: the three are honoured “considering the important evangelical witness they offered in welcoming the Lord Jesus into their home, in listening to him attentively, in believing that he is the resurrection and the life.”
Historical Context
The “Martha, Martha” Problem
Everyone knows the scene. Martha is working; her sister Mary is sitting listening; Martha complains; and Jesus says “Martha, Martha, you are anxious and troubled about many things. One thing is needful” (Luke 10:41–42). Two thousand years of homilies have filed Martha as the well-meaning one who missed the point.
It is worth noticing what the rebuke is actually about. He does not tell her the work does not matter, and he does not tell her to stop. He names the anxiety — anxious and troubled — and he declines to take her side against her sister. The correction is to the resentment, not to the cooking.
And then, three chapters later in John, Martha says the single most important sentence any layperson says in the Gospels.
Her Profession of Faith
Lazarus is dead. Martha goes out to meet Jesus on the road, and she does not pretend to be calm about it — she tells him to his face that if he had been there this would not have happened. Then he says he is the resurrection and the life, and asks whether she believes it.
Yes, Lord, I believe that you are the Christ,
the Son of God,
who is coming into the world.
— John 11:27
Compare it with Peter at Caesarea Philippi: “You are the Christ, the Son of the living God” (Matthew 16:16). It is the same confession. Peter makes his at the height of the ministry and is given the keys for it; Martha makes hers standing in a road, four days into a bereavement, before anything has been fixed.
The Church has never promoted her from the kitchen, and the 2021 decree cites precisely this — “believing that he is the resurrection and the life.” She is not the sister who missed the point. She is the one who said it out loud first.
The Traditional Prayer to Saint Martha
The old Tuesday devotion, and the prayer most people are looking for when they search her name:
Saint Martha, I resort to thy aid and protection.
As proof of my affection and faith,
I offer thee this light, which I shall burn every Tuesday.
Comfort me in all my difficulties,
and through the great favours thou didst enjoy
when the Saviour lodged in thy house,
intercede for my family,
that we may be provided for in our necessities.
I ask of thee, Saint Martha,
to overcome all difficulties as thou didst overcome the dragon
which thou hadst at thy feet.
Amen.
One clarification, because versions of this prayer circulate in folk traditions that present it as a way of compelling an outcome. Catholic devotion to a saint is a request for her prayers — the same thing as asking a friend to pray for you, and no more binding on God than that. A candle is a sign of a request, not a transaction. If a version you have been given promises results in exchange for the ritual, that is not what the Church means by this prayer.
A Prayer for the One Who Does the Work
Martha’s patronage is cooks, servants and housekeepers, and this is the prayer for anyone whose contribution to a household is invisible until it stops.
Saint Martha, you fed him and cleared up afterwards,
and the Gospel remembers the complaint as well as the meal.
Pray for me in the work nobody notices.
Keep me from doing it resentfully
and then wanting to be thanked for not complaining.
Let the house I keep be a place people are glad to come into.
And when I am anxious and troubled about many things,
remind me what the one needful thing is.
Amen.
A Prayer in Grief
Lord, Martha told you to your face
that if you had been here this would not have happened,
and you did not correct her for it.
So I will say it too.
You know what I think about the timing.
Give me what you gave her —
not an explanation, but yourself, standing in the road.
Saints Martha, Mary and Lazarus, pray for us.
Amen.
Best Times for This Prayer
- On 29 July, the memorial of Martha, Mary and Lazarus.
- On Tuesdays, if you keep the traditional candle.
- In household or financial difficulty — her old patronage is provision.
- By cooks, cleaners, carers and anyone running a house.
- In bereavement, especially when you are angry about it.
- When you are doing all the work and resenting someone who is not.
Scripture Connection
“Yes, Lord, I believe that you are the Christ, the Son of God, who is coming into the world.” — John 11:27
Said by a grieving woman on a road, to a man who had arrived four days late, about a brother who was still in the tomb. Nothing had been resolved when she said it and she had every reason not to. That is what the Church means by faith, and it is why her name is on an obligatory memorial rather than a footnote about hospitality.
Related prayers
Her brother has his own page — St Lazarus, the one she was praying for. The Healing Prayer for My Brother is built on this same scene from the sisters’ side.
For the household and its provision, St Joseph is the other patron to know. St Scholastica is the other great sister in the calendar, and for bereavement see the Prayer for Dad in Heaven, which covers praying for the dead.
