Saint Amato Ronconi

Amato Ronconi (1226 – 8 May 1292) was an Italian Catholic who became a professed member of the Secular Franciscan Order. Ronconi lived a life of penitence and dedicated all his works to the poor through the construction of chapels and hospitals – one such hospital still exists in his home of Rimini. The residents in this town recognised his good deeds and hailed Ronconi as a saint in his own lifetime. The confirmation of his popular local "cultus" – or enduring veneration – allowed for Pope Pius VI to celebrate his beatification on 17 April 1776 while Pope Francis canonized Ronconi centuries later on 23 November 2014 in Saint Peter's Square. Amato Ronconi was born in 1225 in Saludecio, near Rimini, to a noble and wealthy household. He was orphaned in childhood and raised in the home of his older brother, Giacomo. As the younger son of a landowner, he had no fortune, so he worked as a farmhand. He had at least one sister named Chiara. Ronconi's sister-in-law urged him to find a woman to wed but Ronconi had decided to serve the Lord as a hermit. His sister-in-law Lansberga came to dislike him as a result of this for she wanted him to wed her younger sister so as to keep her estate intact among familial relations and not amongst outsiders. She first asked Giacomo to have Ronconi change his mind but to keep the peace her husband gave his brother a house with a bit of land as part of his inheritance. He lived there with his sister, working the land. It was located on the road from Rimini to Rome. Ronconi turned it into a hospice for pilgrims which further infuriated his sister-in-law. Lansberga wanted revenge and so began a slanderous rumor – knowing how close he was with his sister Chiara – that both brother and sister were engaging in incestuous relations which was proven false after an investigation.