Saint Enrique de Ossó y Cervelló

Enric d'Ossó i Cervelló (16 October 1840 - 27 January 1896) was a Spanish Catholic priest and the founder of the Society of Saint Teresa of Jesus. He served the role of an educator and an able catechist and published several works on catechesis to that effect while also expressing a keen interest in the value of women and in Teresa of Ávila to whom he dedicated his congregation. Enric d'Ossó i Cervelló was born on 16 October 1840 as the last of three children born to wealthy farmers Jaime de Ossó and Micaela Cervelló. His brother was Jaime. His brother Jaime's son was Lluís de Ossó who helped found FC Barcelona and was one of its first players. His father had been opposed to his being a priest (while his mother favored it) and in 1852 therefore sent him to become an apprentice in the textile business in Quinto; despite this setback he learnt the trade from his uncle who took care of him. But it was there that he became ill to the point where his First Communion was received as the Viaticum though he managed to recover and returned home while stopping off at a Marian shrine along the route to give thanks for his health's restoration. Some time after the death of his mother in 1854 during a cholera outbreak he fled to Montserrat in order to realize his dream and attempted to seek refuge there though his brother Jamie took him home. It was when he returned that his father understood his son's desire and so relented to his son's wishes and agreed to his becoming a priest and so began his studies for the priesthood in 1854. He studied theology in Barcelona where he was made a sub-deacon and later studied at Tortosa before he was ordained to the priesthood on 21 September 1867; he had been a classmate of Emmanuel Domingo i Sol. The new priest celebrated his first Mass in Montserrat on 6 October 1867 and began to teach mathematics to seminarians in Tortosa.