Another Italian layman…
Blessed Contardo Ferrini was a lawyer and an academic, a single layman and a member of the Third Order of St. Francis. It isn’t his feast day today or anything, I just happen to like him and thought I would post something about him.
Blessed Contardo was an esteemed professor of law, a prodigious writer, respected throughout the world. Like Blessed Pier Giorgio Frassati, he enjoyed mountain climbing, finding God in the beauty of nature - accordingly, in his spiritual life he climbed the heights of contemplation. He was a daily communicant, setting aside time for prayer, while he also engaged in much charitable activity, demonstrating his conviction that a life of devotion is most certainly compatible with a professional life of dedication to work and duty. He once said of his career, ”Law is my wife.” in reference to his lifelong vow of celibacy.
Blessed Contardo died at the age of 43 in 1902.
May 6th, 2007 at 11:41 am
Did you note that I posted on a Mayo Clinic pediatric heart surgeon from Italy whose cause for sainthood his being promoted by his Bishop in Italy where he was born?
We already have one Mayo Clinic saint, St Riccardo/Richard Pampuri. And the Venerable Solanus Casey, born in Prescott, WI, near Hastings, MN, who worked for a time in Stillwater before becoming a Capuchin priest in Detroit is on his way towards beatification.
You won’t have to keep posting on foreign saints, Terry. We’ll have plenty of our own some day. Soon, I pray