Today April 5

Today is the feast of the great St. Vincent Ferrer (1350-1419). I don't know about you, but this saint always makes me think of the movie actor José Ferrer! I don't think that our saint today would mind. He himself was bright, good-looking and dramatic, not unlike the actor . . . and most actors.

Our saint today is one of hope, since he was on the wrong side of a religious battle, yet his purity of heart and sanctity made him a saint and not his partisanship. What is amazing is that he even got canonized at all, since the "raising to the altars" is the privilege of the Roman pontiffs. They were objective and magnanimous not to hold it against St. Vincent that he supported the schismatic popes in Avignon! It's weird; many folks were quite taken with the Avignon cardinals who split and elected their own pope in the person of Robert of Geneva known as Clement VII and then Peter de Luna (Benedict XIII), but later kings and commoners alike disapproved of and lost interest in them. St. Vincent remained faithful to the wrong side almost until the end.

He was a child prodigy, graduating college at 14, entering the Dominican order and becoming a Ph.D. in philosophy at 20. He taught for awhile at University of Lerida and then left academia for parish work at Barcelona. He was gifted in many ways, but his first big break was his entirely accurate prediction of the end of a famine with the arrival of relief ships. The common folk were quite taken with him. Thus began a long and illustrious career as a preacher, penitent and miracle-worker, who not only converted 25,00 Jews but thousands of Moslems as well. He raised at least 28 persons from the dead, including a man going to his burial at the same time as a convicted criminal was sentenced to die. St. Vincent addressed the corpse, "You no longer have anything to gain by lying. [!] Is this man guilty? Answer me!" The dead man sat up and then spoke the words: "No, he is not!" Vincent asked him if he would like to return to life on earth. "No, good Father, for I am assured of salvation." Then he died a second time, lying back in his bier as easily as if he were going to sleep. Another man he raised asked to live, and so he did. Many priests at the convent of St. Jean at Calabria witnessed him raise a corpse there, and another priest swears he raised a child just by making the sign of the cross over him. My favorite story is his raising of a Jew named Abraham who was crushed to death under a stone porch of a church in which Vincent was preaching. Vincent rushed to his side, knelt in prayer over the poor body, after which Abraham rose and stunningly proclaimed, "The religion of the Jews is not the true faith. The true faith is that of the Christians." The man was baptized soon after. In like manner, lesser miracles were performed by Vincent: 70 persons freed from demonic possession, the stopping of a storm (at Majorca) and a flood (at Beziers), returning speech to the mute and health to cripples and the sick. Also, reminiscent of the first Apostles, all who heard him preach (French, Italian, German, English and Spanish alike) understood him even though he only spoke Limousin, a dialect of French. (And what a cool name, too: "Limousin." I wonder if it's pronounced the same way as the transport.) He counseled union with Rome to the Avignon anti-pope and was distressed when he refused. Even a council of theologians in Parish backed Rome, as did the Council of Constance (which deposed a second antipope: John XXIII). When even King Ferdinand of Castile and Aragon backed Rome alone, Ferdinand being the king whom Vincent himself had helped to elect, Vincent finally agreed and not long afterward Benedict XIII was deposed. Vincent died peacefully in France, reconciled with Rome at last.