Meet new saints proclaimed for the universal church in October 2009:

• Father Damian of Molokai who lived and worked with people with leprosy on the Hawaiian  island of Molokai. See June 4.
• Jeanne Jugan, also known as Sister Mary of the Cross and founder of the Little Sisters of the Poor. See August 30.

Meet for the first time Karl Kulper, a homeless person who lived in a bus shelter outside St Vincent's Hospital in Sydney, and known to all as 'the old gentleman'. He died in 2002. See September 14.

Are you familiar with Saint Francis of Assisi's 'Canticle of the Creatures', the song in which he calls out in praise of God with and through all of creation? See October 4, 5 & 6. And have you used the Blessing of Pets appropriate for this time? See the prayer at the beginning of October.

Also new this year is A Prayer for the Earth on Earth Day Earth day has been celebrated since 1970, when our astronauts showed us pictures of the way our planet looks from space. It looks very fragile and very beautiful. See page 96.

Have you met in previous issues:

• Brother Roger Schutz who founded the community of brothers at Taizé in France, and which attracts millions of young people from all over the world? See August 16.
• Dame Cicely Saunders, the first modern doctor to dedicate her entire career caring for people facing death through terminal illness? She is the founder of the modern hospice movement. See July 14.