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The saints

St. Barnabas

His real name was Joseph. The apostles nicknamed him Son of Encouragement.

Feast: 11 June · 1st century · The early Church · Cyprus and Antioch

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Painting of St. Barnabas, an old bearded man, reading a sheet of paper.

Anonimo Lombardo, 2008. Wikimedia Commons, Public domain.

Home / The saints / St. Barnabas

Jerusalem and Antioch

A man from Cyprus sold a field and laid the money at the apostles’ feet.1

They called him Barnabas, which means son of encouragement.2

When the whole Church was afraid of the newly converted Saul, Barnabas vouched for him.

Patron of Cyprus5

01St. Barnabas

A good man

Acts calls him a good man, full of the Holy Spirit and of faith.3

He went and found Saul in Tarsus and brought him to Antioch, where the disciples were first called Christians.4

02St. Barnabas

The encourager

He sailed with Paul on the first missionary journey, and later stood up for his cousin Mark when Paul would not.5

Tradition says he was martyred in Cyprus.5

Live it this week

Encourage someone specifically

Barnabas saw what Saul and Mark could become before anyone else did. This week, tell three people one specific thing they do well. Not “great job”: name the thing.

Notes

How we know · 5 sources for this page
  1. Acts 4:37, World English Bible. read the chapter
  2. Acts 4:36, World English Bible. read the chapter
  3. Acts 11:24, World English Bible. read the chapter
  4. Acts 11:26, World English Bible. read the chapter
  5. Franciscan Media, Saint of the Day: “Saint Barnabas”. franciscanmedia.org. franciscanmedia.org

The Catholic Encyclopedia (1913) is in the public domain; we quote the New Advent edition. Texts of the Holy See are quoted briefly from vatican.va. Scripture: World English Bible, Catholic edition (public domain); Verse numbers are modern, with Douay-Rheims numbers in brackets where they differ. Photographs: Wikimedia Commons, credited under each image; full list on the photo credits page.

Lines in the narrator’s voice, without a note, are our reflection, not a historical claim. Stone & Incense restates Church teaching in plain words; our wording is not an official Church text. Report an errorCorrections.