St. Foy is a badass. Her cult was at its peak in France in the 12th century. She’s not ‘forgotten’ in Europe, and probably everybody who seriously studies medieval Europe has heard of her, but she’s not the sort of saint your average Catholic has much to do with anymore, hence her going into my Forgotten Saints series.
She was a virgin martyr who was roasted to death at the age of 12 (or saved from roasting only to be beheaded, depending on which version of the story you hear). Her reliquary contained some remains from her skull, and she was credited with many miracles. There is a book of her miracles, in fact, there were so many of them. They included smiting the feudal landowners who threatened her abbey’s holdings with illness and death, curing blindness, freeing prisoners, and raising people from the dead. When people pissed her off, she would often appear in their dreams and threaten them. Prisoners who escaped or were freed from their prisons after petitioning her often brought their iron chains with them to pay their respects at her shrine; the monks at Conques who cared for her relics used the iron to build things for the church.
While she’s not called on to protect thieves as far as I know, I imagine that she could be, as long as the thief was working for the Greater Good and paid tribute to her. You see, her relics were stolen from Agen by a monk from Conques and relocated to the abbey at Conques; apparently the abbey, the monk, and the cult of the saint all prospered afterward. It was at Conques that the magnificent reliquary you see below was made.
Her name means "faith," and depending on the language, you will see her referred to as St. Foy, Sainte Foi, Santa Fe, and St. Fides. Her feast day is October 6.
Big Lucky Hoodoo 