Feast day: October 23
St. John of Capistrano
A lawyer and governor who became a Franciscan and one of the most powerful preachers of his age, and who at seventy helped rally the defense that broke the siege of Belgrade.
John of Capistrano was born in 1386 in the Abruzzi region of Italy and trained as a lawyer, rising to become governor of the city of Perugia. Imprisoned during a war, he underwent a profound conversion, and on his release renounced his career and prospects to enter the Franciscans of the strict Observant reform.
Under the great St. Bernardine of Siena he became one of the most powerful preachers of the fifteenth century. For decades he criss-crossed Italy and then much of central Europe — Austria, Bohemia, Poland, Hungary — preaching penance and reform to enormous crowds, combating heresy, and labouring tirelessly to renew the religious and moral life of the people. He was also a noted writer on law and theology.
The drama of his last years unfolded against the advance of the Ottoman Turks, who in 1453 had taken Constantinople and now threatened to overrun Christian Europe. Though nearly seventy, John threw himself into rousing and organizing resistance, preaching the crusade and personally accompanying the army to the defence of Belgrade.
At the siege of Belgrade in 1456 the aged friar, crucifix in hand, helped rally and lead the Christian forces to a decisive victory that halted the Turkish advance for generations. Worn out, he died a few months later. Canonized in 1690, the lawyer-friar is honoured as a patron of jurists and of military chaplains.
At nearly seventy he marched with a crusading army and, crucifix in hand, helped save Belgrade from the Ottoman siege of 1456.
Image: Unknown authorUnknown author (Public domain), via Wikimedia Commons.
Source: newadvent.org/cathen/08452a.htm
Get a story like this every Sunday.