St. Anthony of Padua

ST ANTHONY OF PADUA 3
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Anthony was born in the year 1195 at Lisbon, Portugal, where his father
was a captain in the royal army. Already at the age of fifteen years the youth had
entered the Congregation of Canons Regular of St. Augustine… in the monastery
at Coimbra, when… the relics of St. Berard and companions, the first martyrs of
the Franciscan Order, were being brought from Africa to Coimbra. At the sight of
them, Anthony was seized with an intense desire to suffer martyrdom as a
Franciscan missionary in Africa. In response to his repeated and humble
petitions, the permission of his superiors to transfer to the Franciscan Order was
reluctantly given. At his departure, one of the canons said to him ironically: “Go
then, perhaps you will become a saint in the new order.” Anthony replied:
“Brother, when you hear that I have become a saint, you will surely praise God
for it.”
In the quiet little Franciscan convent at Coimbra he received a friendly
reception, and in the very same year his earnest wish to be sent to the missions
in Africa was fulfilled… Anthony scarcely set foot on African soil when he was
seized with a grievous illness. Even after recovering from it, he was so weak that,
resigning himself to the will of God, he boarded a boat back to Portugal…
Anthony was sent to Forli with some other brethren, to attend the
ceremony of ordination. At the convent there the superior wanted somebody to
give an address for the occasion. Everybody excused himself, saying that he was
not prepared, until Anthony was finally asked to give it. When he, too, excused
himself most humbly, his superior ordered him by virtue of the vow of obedience
to give the sermon. Anthony began to speak in a very reserved manner; but soon
holy animation seized him, and he spoke with such eloquence, learning, and
unction that everybody was fairly amazed. When St. Francis was informed of the
event, he gave Anthony the mission to preach all over Italy. At the request of the
brethren, Anthony was later commissioned also to teach theology, “but in such a
manner,” St. Francis distinctly wrote, “that the spirit of prayer be not
extinguished either in yourself or in the other brethren.”
St. Anthony himself placed greater value on the salvation of souls than on
learning. For that reason he never ceased to exercise his office as preacher along
with the work of teaching. The concourse of hearers was sometimes so great
that no church was large enough to accommodate the audiences and he had to
preach in the open air. He wrought veritable miracles of conversion. Deadly
enemies were reconciled with each other. Thieves and usurers made restitution
of their ill-gotten goods. Calumniators and detractors recanted and apologized.
He was so energetic in defending the truths of the Catholic Faith that many
heretics re-entered the pale of the Church, so that Pope Gregory IX called him
“the ark of the covenant.”… In all his labors he never forgot the admonition of his
spiritual Father, that the spirit of prayer must not be extinguished. If he spent
the day in teaching, and heard the confessions of sinners till late in the evening,
then many hours of the night were spent in intimate union with God…
Due to his taxing labors and his austere practice of penance, he soon felt
his strength so spent that he prepared himself for death. After receiving the last
sacraments he kept looking upward with a smile on his countenance. When he
was asked what he saw there, he answered: “I see my Lord.”… He breathed forth
his soul on June 13, 1231, being only thirty-six years old. Pope Gregory IX
enrolled him among the saints the very next year… In 1946 he was declared a
Doctor of the Church.

3 Habig, Marion O.F.M. The Franciscan Book of Saints. Chicago, IL: Franciscan Herald Press, 1959. 415-418.