Saints celebrated on the 23rd of May
SAINT JOHN BAPTIST DE ROSSI, PRIEST
St John Baptist de Rossi was born at Voltaggio in the Diocese of Genoa, February 22, 1698. He pursued his studies at the Collegium Romanum under the direction of the Jesuits. A member of the Sodality of the Blessed Virgin and of the Ristretto of the Twelve Apostles established at the college, he led the members in the meetings and pious exercises, in visits to the sick in the hospitals and in other works of mercy.
HE WAS ORDAINED PRIEST
At the age of sixteen he entered the clerical state. Owing to indiscreet practices of mortification he contracted spells of epilepsy, notwithstanding which he made his course of scholastic philosophy and theology, in the college of the Dominicans, and, with dispensation, was ordained priest on March 8, 1721. Having reached the desired goal, he bound himself by vow to accept no ecclesiastical benefice unless commanded by obedience. He fulfilled the duties of the sacred ministry by devoting himself to the labourers, herds, and teamsters of the Campagna, preaching to them early in the morning, or late in the evening, at the old Forum Romanum, and by visiting, instructing, and assisting the poor at the hospital of St Galla.
In 1731 he established near St Galla another hospital as a home of refuge for the unfortunates who wander the city by night. In 1735 he became titular canon at St Mary in Cosmedin, and, on the death of Lorenzo two years later, obedience forced him to accept the canonry. The house belonging to it, however, he would not use, but employed the rent for good purposes.
HEARING CONFESSIONS
For a number of years John was afraid, on account of his sickness, to enter the confessional, and it was his custom to send to other priests the sinners whom he had brought to repentance by his instructions and sermons. In 1738 a dangerous sickness befell him, and to regain his health he went to Civita Castellana, a day's journey from Rome. The bishop of the place induced him to hear confessions, and after reviewing his moral theology he received the unusual faculty of hearing confessions in any of the churches of Rome.
He showed extraordinary zeal in the exercise of this privilege, and spent many hours every day in hearing the confessions of the illiterate and the poor whom he sought in the hospitals and in their homes. He preached to such five and six times a day in churches, chapels, convents, hospitals, barracks, and prison cells, so that he became the apostle of the abandoned, a hunter of souls.
In 1763, worn out by labours and continued ill-health, his strength began to fail, and after several attacks of paralysis he died at his quarters in Trinita de' Pellegrini. Leo XIII enrolled him among the saints.
Excerpts from Catholic Encyclopedia, 1913
PRAYER:
Grant, we beseech you, almighty God, that the venerable feast of Saint John Baptist de Rossi may increase our devotion and promote our salvation. Through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son, who lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit, God, for ever and ever. Amen.
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