March 28, St. John of Capistrano, Priest, religious of the Franciscan 1st Order.
St. John Capistran, born in 1385, seems to have been selected by God as a chosen vessel in which to carry the Name of Jesus to all nations. On foot he covered Italy, the Tyrol, Bavaria, Austria, all the Principalities of Germany, Bohemia, Hungary, Moravia, Silesia, Bosnia, Poland and several provinces in France and in Russia, everywhere repressing evil, destroying schisms and confounding heresies. Popes Martin V, Eugenius IV, Nicholas V and Calixtus III used him in succession for affairs of the greatest importance. He was in turn nuncio, legate, apostolic commissary and inquisitor general. The heathen, schematics, heretics and sinners who owed their conversion to him cannot be numbered. Preaching one day in Bohemia on the Last Judgment, he brought a multitude of young men to God, 60 of whom joined his Order soon after. Later, he converted 130 more, of whom 100 became Franciscans. He founded a monastery of …
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