How to Be a Saint
  • Published: 28 October 2025
  • ISBN: 9781728277417
  • Imprint: Sourcebooks
  • Format: Hardback
  • Pages: 160
  • RRP: $40.00

How to Be a Saint

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A satirical guide book that's part history lesson, part sacrilege, and an entirely good time.

Part history lesson. Part sacrilege. An entirely good time.

Think you have what it takes to be a saint? Lucky for you, thousands of souls have paved the way to heaven—creating a clear formula for getting the job done while also leaving a rich, disturbing history behind them. And in just five easy-ish steps, you can learn how to secure your own halo!

But even if the whole "dying and becoming a saint" thing doesn't appeal to you, the bizarrely bureaucratic process of canonization is still guaranteed to delight and entertain. How to Be Saint is a compulsively readable and endlessly entertaining ride through Catholicism for anyone who enjoys their history with a side of comedy. From flying friars to severed heads, this book explores the wild lives (and deaths) of saints and pulls the curtain back on the oddest quirks of religious doctrine.

Whether you're a lifelong Catholic or a weird-history enthusiast, How to Be a Saint is your ultimate guide to understanding the hilarious, fascinating, and shockingly true history of sainthood.
  • Published: 28 October 2025
  • ISBN: 9781728277417
  • Imprint: Sourcebooks
  • Format: Hardback
  • Pages: 160
  • RRP: $40.00

About the author

Kate Sidley

KATE SIDLEY is a Writers Guild and Peabody award-winning, seven-time Emmy-nominated writer and performer living in New York. Currently, she is a writer and digital content producer for The Late Show with Stephen Colbert. In addition to her comedy writing, Kate is a recovering Catholic school girl. To this day, she refuses to wear plaid skirts.

Praise for How to Be a Saint

Hilarious! This is, without a doubt, the most important book in Christianity.

Felipe Torres Medina, author of America, Let Me In: A Choose Your Immigration Story

How to Be a Saint is a smart, funny, and delightfully weird deep dive into Catholicism. Plus, I'm pretty sure reading it gets you into Heaven.

Kristen Bartlett, writer, Full Frontal with Samantha Bee and Saturday Night Live

How to Be a Saint is a divinely funny and surprisingly informative exploration of how the Saints became Saints… and how you can, too. Kate Sidley brings the humor of a tenured late-night comedy writer and the repression of a lifelong Catholic to this consecrated guide for anyone interested in the cheat codes to Heaven.... If you want to piss the Devil off, buy this book!

Nicole Conlan, writer, The Daily Show

Kate Sidley is one of the sharpest, funniest people I’ve ever been lucky enough to know and this book somehow manages to be as sharp and funny as she is. Weird. Thanks to Kate from a fellow Catholic for all the laughs and for the very helpful advice on how to get past heaven’s airtight security system.

Brian Stack, writer, The Late Show with Stephen Colbert and Late Night with Conan O'Brien

I laughed so hard, but I also learned so much? Kate Sidley is a brilliant writer!

Jo Firestone, head writer and co-executive producer, After Midnight

If you are aspiring towards canonization, Kate Sidley's How To Be A Saint is the one book you must read. The second is probably the Bible, but it isn't as funny. Sidley mines the humor found in theology, as she covers everything from the heroic virtues to different kinds of halos. This is a work that is sure to appeal to both the devout and those who definitely at least intend to go to church on Christmas and Easter.

Jennifer Wright, author of Glitz, Glam and a Damn Good TIme: How Mamie Fish, Queen of the Gilded Age, Partied Her Way To Power