Saint Rose of Lima, née Isabel Flores de Oliva, (30 April 1586 - 30 August 1617), the first Catholic saint of The Americas, was born in Lima, Peru and is the patroness of Peru, The Americas and the Philippines. She took the name of Rose at her confirmation in 1597. She received Holy Communion daily, and was conferred the habit of St. Dominic at the age of 20. The Catholic Church says that many miracles followed her death. All the places named Santa Rosa in the New World pay homage to this saint. Pope Benedict XVI has an special devotion for this Saint.

As a child she was possessed with a deep veneration for every aspect of religion, and spent hours with her attention fixed upon the image of the Madonna and Child. She gave her entire life to prayer and the most extreme self-mortification. The Catholic Encyclopedia observed, "She was scrupulously obedient and of untiring industry, making rapid progress by earnest attention to her parents' instruction, to her studies, and to her domestic work, especially with her needle."

In emulation of St. Catherine she fasted three times a week with secret severe penances, and when she was admired, cut off her hair against the objections of her friends and her family, and the censure of her parents, then disfigured her face with oil of vitriol.

Many hours were spent contemplating the Blessed Sacrament, which she received daily. She determined to take a vow of virginity in opposition to her parents, who wished her to marry. Her Vita emphasizes "her excruciating agony of mind and desolation of spirit, urging her to more frequent mortifications."

Daily fasting turned to perpetual abstinence from meat. Her days were filled with acts of charity and industry, her exquisite lace and embroidery helping to support her home, while her nights were devoted to prayer and penance in a little grotto which she had built in which she became a recluse,leaving it only for her visits to the Blessed Sacrament.

In her twentieth year she had so attracted the attention of the Dominican order that she was permitted to enter a Dominican convent in 1602 without payment of the usual dowry. "Thereafter she redoubled the severity and variety of her penances to a heroic degree, wearing constantly a metal spiked crown, concealed by roses, and an iron chain about her waist. Days passed without food, save a draught of gall mixed with bitter herbs. When she could no longer stand, she sought repose on a bed constructed by herself, of broken glass, stone, potsherds, and thorns. She admitted that the thought of lying down on it made her tremble with dread."

Fourteen years this self-martyrdom continued without relaxation, with intervals of ecstasy (CE). Her funeral was attended by all the public authorities of Lima, and the archbishop pronounced her eulogy in the cathedral, August 26, 1617.

She was beatified by Pope Clement IX in 1667, and canonized in 1671 by Pope Clement X. Her feast was celebrated initially on 30 August, but currently on 23 August. Saint Rose of Lima's Day on August 30 is a public holiday in Peru.

Early Lives of Santa Rosa were written by the Dominican Father Hansen, Vita Sanctae Rosae (2 vols., Rome, 1664–'8), and Vicente Orsini, afterward Pope Benedict XIII wrote Concentus Dominicano, Bononiensis ecclesia, in album Sanctorum Ludovici Bertrandi et Rosae de Sancta Maria, ordinero praedicatorum, (Venice, 1674).

She is depicted wearing a metal-spiked crown, concealed by roses, and an iron chain around her waist.