Feast day: September 10

St. Nicholas of Tolentino

Priest, Friar · 1245–1305

Patron of Holy souls in purgatory

An Augustinian friar who spent thirty years preaching, hearing confessions, and serving the poor and sick of one Italian town, and who is especially invoked for the souls in purgatory.

Nicholas was born about 1245 at Sant'Angelo, in the March of Ancona in central Italy, the answered prayer of a childless couple who had made a pilgrimage to the shrine of St. Nicholas of Bari to beg for a son — hence his name. Drawn young to the religious life, he entered the Hermits of St. Augustine and was ordained a priest.

He spent the last thirty years of his life at Tolentino, where he became a famous and tireless preacher, said to have given a sermon almost daily, and an even more sought-after confessor, gentle and patient with sinners. He was renowned for his austerity, his meekness, and the many miracles attributed to him, especially cures of the sick.

His enduring fame rests on his devotion to the souls in purgatory. He is said to have been granted a vision of suffering souls who begged his prayers, and thereafter he offered Masses and penances unceasingly for the dead. For this he became, above all others, the patron and advocate of the holy souls in purgatory, and the custom of 'St. Nicholas's bread,' blessed and given to the sick, spread in his name.

He died at Tolentino in 1305 and was canonized in 1446 — the first Augustinian friar to be raised to the altars. He remains one of the most popular intercessors for the faithful departed.

Told in a vision to pray for the dead, he became the great patron of the holy souls in purgatory — and is said to have refused all food but bread soaked with a sign of the cross.

Image: Ambito bolognese (Public domain), via Wikimedia Commons.

Source: newadvent.org/cathen/11065a.htm