In the Catholic Church, there are patron saints for nearly every profession. This is encouraging, as it can give us examples to follow, and saints to invoke for our particular vocation.
For anyone who is a bookseller or publisher (especially if you are trying to self-publish your book), Blessed James Duckett is the saint for you.
He was a married layperson during the 16th and early 17th century who chose to publish Catholic literature at a time in England when such an action was against the law.
Converted after reading a Catholic book
Duckett was raised in a Protestant family, but later on converted to Catholicism. The Catholic Encyclopedia explains that "he was converted while an apprentice in London by reading a Catholic book lent him by a friend."
He married a Catholic woman, but was imprisoned for most of his married life, due to his zeal and desire to spread the Catholic faith in Protestant England. They did have one child, who would later enter a Catholic monastery and became abbot.
While he was imprisoned, a former employee sought to lessen his own sentence in jail by alerting the authorities to Duckett's publishing activities. This led to his martyrdom, and was executed on April 19, 1601.
Here is how the Roman Martyrology summarizes his life:
At London in England, Bl. James Duckett, martyr, who, as a married man, betrayed because he was selling Catholic texts in his bookshop, was kept for nine years in prison and finally hanged at Tyburn under Queen Elizabeth I together with his informer, whom he now on the verge of death invited to die as a Catholic.
Duckett is a courageous example and a great intercessor for anyone who desires to publish books about the Catholic faith in a culture that often opposes it.
