You appear to be asking after Saint Stanislaus of Szczepanów (c. 1030–1079), the great Bishop of Kraków and principal patron of Poland. (There is also a younger and equally beloved saint, Saint Stanislaus Kostka, S.J., whom we shall touch upon briefly at the end, lest there be any confusion.) The name Stanislaus — Stanisław in Polish — means “he who stands in glory.”
Birth and Early Formation
Stanislaus was born around the year 1030 in the village of Szczepanów, in Lesser Poland, to noble parents named Wielisław and Bogna. Tradition holds that his parents had long been barren and had begged Almighty God for a son, vowing to consecrate him to the divine service should their prayer be heard. The child was given to study from his earliest years, and providence carried him first to the cathedral school at Gniezno and afterward, it is believed, to Paris, where he steeped himself in canon law and the sacred sciences.
Returning to Poland upon the death of his parents, he distributed his considerable patrimony to the poor — a gesture in which the Fathers have always discerned the mark of true sanctity, recalling the words of Our Lord: “If thou wilt be perfect, go sell what thou hast, and give to the poor, and thou shalt have treasure in heaven; and come, follow me.” (Matt. xix. 21, Douay-Rheims). He was ordained a priest by Lambert Suła, Bishop of Kraków, and served for a time as a canon and preacher of remarkable power, drawing souls to penance by the gravity of his life and the ardor of his speech.
Bishop of Kraków
Upon the death of Bishop Lambert in 1072, Stanislaus was raised — reluctantly, as the chroniclers tell us, for he had no appetite for honors — to the episcopal throne of Kraków. He was consecrated with the approbation of Pope Alexander II. As bishop, he became known for three things above all: the splendor of his liturgical reverence, his unwearied charity to the poor, and his fearless defense of the moral law against the encroachments of the powerful.
It is here that his life intersects with that of King Bolesław II, called the Bold (or, more darkly, the Cruel). The king, though valiant in arms and once a benefactor of the Church, fell into grievous and notorious sins — adulteries, rapine, and acts of cruelty against his nobles and their wives. The other bishops kept silence, whether from fear or from human respect; Stanislaus alone did not. After private admonitions failed to move the king, the holy bishop pronounced upon him the sentence of excommunication, forbidding him entrance to the cathedral and the participation in the Holy Sacrifice.
The Miracle of Piotrowin
A celebrated episode from his episcopate, preserved by the medieval hagiographer Wincenty of Kielcza, recounts that Stanislaus had purchased a parcel of land for the diocese from a man named Piotr (Peter) of Piotrowin. After Piotr’s death, the king, seeking pretext to ruin the bishop, demanded proof of the sale, knowing the witnesses had died. Stanislaus, after three days of fasting and prayer, went to Piotr’s tomb, bade him rise in the name of Christ, and led the resurrected man before the royal court to give testimony. The deed accomplished, Piotr returned to his grave to await the general resurrection. Whatever the historical particulars, the Church has long received this account as expressive of the bishop’s intimacy with God and his unshaken trust in divine vindication.
Martyrdom
Inflamed with rage at his excommunication, King Bolesław pursued Stanislaus to the little Church of Saint Michael on the Skałka (the Rock), just outside Kraków, where the bishop was offering the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass on the 11th of April, 1079. The royal guards, struck with awe, refused thrice to lay hands upon him; whereupon Bolesław himself drew his sword and struck down the bishop at the very altar, hacking his body in pieces afterward in a fury reminiscent of Herod. Tradition, beautifully attested in Polish piety, holds that the dismembered limbs of the martyr were miraculously rejoined, signifying — as later commentators have observed — the future reunion of the partitioned Polish nation under the patronage of her bishop-saint.
Canonization and Cultus
Stanislaus was canonized by Pope Innocent IV at Assisi on the 17th of September, 1253 — the first native son of Poland to be raised to the altars. His relics rest in the magnificent silver reliquary at the heart of the Wawel Cathedral in Kraków, and his feast is kept on the 7th of May in the Roman Martyrology and the traditional Roman Calendar (the date being the translation of his relics; the 11th of April, the day of his martyrdom, is observed in Poland). He is venerated as the principal patron of Poland, together with Our Lady of Częstochowa and Saint Adalbert.
In the spiritual genealogy of the Church, Saint Stanislaus stands among that noble company of bishop-martyrs who shed their blood resisting the abuse of secular power — alongside Saint Thomas Becket of Canterbury, Saint John Nepomucene of Prague, and, in earlier ages, Saint Ambrose confronting the Emperor Theodosius. His witness teaches us, as Pope Saint Pius X would later affirm, that the bishop is speculator domus Israel — the watchman of the house of Israel — and may not hold his peace when souls are imperilled by scandal in high places.
Lessons for Imitation
The faithful soul may draw from Stanislaus’s life several abiding lessons. First, that fear of God must always overmaster the fear of man, even when princes are arrayed against the truth. Second, that fraternal correction is a true work of mercy, and that pastors especially are bound to it under pain of sharing in the sins they tolerate. Third, that the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass is the worthiest setting in which a Christian may yield up his life — for there the priest is most perfectly conformed to the immolated Lamb.
A Brief Note on Saint Stanislaus Kostka
Lest you intended the other Stanislaus: Saint Stanislaus Kostka (1550–1568) was a young Polish Jesuit novice of noble Mazovian birth, renowned for his angelic purity and ardent love of the Blessed Virgin, who received him in a vision and laid the Christ-Child in his arms. He died at Rome at the age of seventeen, on the eve of the Assumption, having predicted his own death. His feast falls on the 13th of November in the traditional calendar. He is the patron of novices, students, and the dying.
A Suggested Prayer
O God, in honor of whose worship the glorious Bishop Stanislaus fell beneath the swords of the impious, grant, we beseech Thee, that all who implore his aid may obtain the salutary fruit of their petition. Through Christ Our Lord. Amen. — Collect from the Roman Missal, Feast of St. Stanislaus, 7 May
To Continue Your Study
If the lives of bishops and martyrs draw you, the Lives of the Saints path would be a fitting next course, perhaps treating next of Saint Thomas Becket, whose life forms a luminous parallel to that of our Polish patron. Should you wish to explore the deeper question of the relation between sacred and secular authority that lies behind his martyrdom, the Theology and Doctrine path treats this matter under the headings of the potestas indirecta of the Church and the duties of Christian princes.
Sancte Stanislae, ora pro nobis.