Saint Cajetan

Gaetano dei Conti di Thiene CR (6 October 1480 – 7 August 1547), known in English as Saint Cajetan , was an Italian Catholic priest and religious reformer, co-founder of the Theatines. He is recognised as a saint in the Catholic Church, and his feast day is 7 August. Cajetan was born in October 1480, the son of Gaspar, lord of Thiene, and Mary Porta, persons of the first rank among the nobility of the territory of Vicenza, in Veneto Region. His father died when he was two years of age. Quiet and retiring by nature, Cajetan was predisposed to piety by his mother. Cajetan studied law in Padua, receiving his degree as doctor utriusque juris (i.e., in civil and canon law) at age 24. In 1506 he worked as a diplomat for Pope Julius II, with whom he helped reconcile the Republic of Venice. However, he was not ordained a priest until the year 1516. With the death of Pope Julius II in 1513, Cajetan withdrew from the papal court. Recalled to Vicenza by the death of his mother, he founded in 1522 a hospital for incurables there. By 1523, he had established a hospital in Venice, as well. His interests were as much or more devoted to spiritual healing than the physical kind, and he joined a confraternity in Rome called the "Oratory of Divine Love". He intended to form a group that would combine the spirit of monasticism with the exercises of the active ministry. A new congregation was canonically erected by Pope Clement VII in the year 1524. One of his four companions was Giovanni Pietro Carafa, the Bishop of Chieti, elected first superior of the order, who later became pope as Paul IV. From the name of the city of Chieti (in Latin: Theate), arose the name by which the order is known, the "Theatines". The order grew at a fairly slow pace: there were only twelve Theatines during the sack of Rome in 1527, during which Cajetan was tortured by mutinous soldiers of Charles V.