Saint Leonard of Port Maurice

Leonard of Port Maurice, O.F.M., (Italian: San Leonardo da Porto Maurizio; 20 December 1676 – 26 November 1751) was an Italian Franciscan preacher and ascetic writer. Leonard was born 19 December 1676, the son of Domenico Casanova and Anna Maria Benza. He was given the name Paul Jerome Casanova. Leonard's father was a ship captain whose family lived in Port Maurice on the northwestern coast of Italy. At 13, Leonard went to Rome to live with his uncle Agostino and study at the Jesuit Roman College. He was a good student and destined for a career in medicine. In 1697, however, he joined the Friars Minor. When he decided against medicine, his uncle disowned him. On 2 October 1697, he received the habit and took the name Brother Leonard, after a relative who had been kind to him. After making his novitiate at Ponticelli in the Sabine mountains, he completed his studies at St. Bonaventura on the Palatine at Rome. After his ordination he remained there as lector (professor), and expected to be sent on the Chinese missions. After ordination Leonard contracted a bleeding ulcer and was sent to his hometown where there was a monastery of the Franciscan Observants (1704). After four years he was restored to health, and began to preach in Porto Maurizio. When Cosimo III de' Medici handed over the monastery del Monte (on San Miniato near Florence, also called Monte alle Croci) to the members of the Riformella, Leonard was sent hither under the auspices and by desire of Cosimo III, and began shortly to hold missions among the people of Tuscany. His colleagues and he practiced austerities and penances during these missions. In 1710 he founded the monastery of Icontro, on a peak in the mountains about four miles from Florence, whither he and his assistants could retire from time to time after missions, and devote themselves to spiritual renewal. Alphonsus Liguori called Leonard "the great missionary of the 18th century".