ST. CELESTINE V, POPE

The Saint of the Day for May 19 is ST. CELESTINE.

Born 1215, in the Neapolitan province of Moline; elected at Perugia 5 July, 1294; crowned at Aquila, 29 August; abdicated at Naples, 13 Dec., 1294; died in the castle of Fumone, 19 May, 1296.

A saint who will always be remembered for the bizarre manner in which he was elected Pope, his spectacular incompetence in that office, and for the distinction of being the only pontiff ever to have resigned.

Pietro di Murrone was born in Born 1215, in the Neapolitan province of Moline; elected at Perugia 5 July, 1294; consecrated and crowned at Aquila, 29 August; abdicated at Naples, 13 Dec., 1294; died in the castle of Fumone, 19 May, 1296. He was of humble parentage, became a Benedictine at the age of seventeen, and was eventually ordained priest at Rome. His love of solitude led him first into the wilderness of Monte Morone in the Abruzzi, whence his surname, and later into the wilder recesses of Mt. Majella. He took for his model the Baptist. His hair-cloth was roughened with knots; a chain of iron encompassed his emaciated frame; he fasted every day except Sunday; each year he kept four Lents, passing three of them on bread and water; the entire day and a great part of the night he consecrated to prayer and labour. As generally happens in the case of saintly anchorites, Peter's desire for solitude was not destined to be gratified. Many kindred spirits gathered about him eager to imitate his rule of life, and before his death there were thirty- six monasteries, numbering 600 religious, bearing his papal name (Celestini). The order was approved, as a branch of the Benedictines, by Urban IV, in 1264. This congregation of (Benedictine) Celestines must not be confounded with other (Franciscan) Celestines, extreme Spirituals whom Pope Celestine permitted (1294) to live as hermits according to the Rule of St. Francis, but were pendent of the Franciscan superiors. In gratitude they called themselves after the pope (Pauperes eremitæ Domini Celestine), but were dissolved and dispersed (1302) by Boniface VIII, whose legitimacy the Spirituals contested [Heimbucher, Orden und Kongregationen (2nd ed. Paderborn, 1907); I, 280; II, 360]. In 1284, Pietro, weary of the cares of government, appointed a certain Robert as his vicar and plunged again into the depths of the wilderness. It would be well if some Catholic scholar would devote some time to a thorough investigation of his relations to the extreme spiritual party of that age; for though it is certain that the pious hermit did not approve of the heretical tenets held by the leaders, it is equally true that the fanatics, during his life and after his death, made copious use of his name.