Originally published at National Catholic Register
Ignatius Press has just published the first comprehensive biography in more than 1,000 years of the beloved fifth- and sixth-century Irish saint Kevin of Glendalough. Saint Kevin of Glendalough: Hermit, Abbot, and Miracle Worker introduces a wider audience to this remarkable saint — part-evangelist, part-hermit — who founded a monastery, worked miracles, communed with animals, and inspired thousands to leave everything to follow Christ.
The book’s author, Kevin McKenzie, visited the places where the saint lived and personally translated the 1,000-year-old Latin life of St. Kevin into English. In addition, McKenzie set out to walk from Ireland to Rome to better understand his patron saint’s own pilgrimage to Rome.
The Register spoke to McKenzie from his home in St. Louis, where he works as an author of books on saints and leads pilgrimages to Italy and Ireland.
Researching the Life of St. Kevin
McKenzie spent nearly a decade researching the life of this seemingly obscure saint. His first research trip to Ireland was in 2015, and he completed the book in September 2024. “I did four trips all told,” he explains. “In between, there was a lot of reading and writing. Over 1,400 years separate us from Kevin, and he
