Il beato Antonio Baldinucci con l'immagine di Maria Refugium peccatorum
Bienheureux Antoine Baldinucci
Jésuite à Pofi, au diocèse de
Veroli (+ 1717)
Martyrologe romain
SOURCE : https://nominis.cef.fr/contenus/saint/57/Bienheureux-Antoine-Baldinucci.html
Bienheureux Antoine Baldinucci
Antoine Baldinucci, italien, est né en 1665 près de
Florence. Malgré sa mauvaise santé qui l’empêchait d’aller comme missionnaire
en Inde, en Chine ou au Japon, le père Antonio Baldinucci (1665-1717) mena une
vie dure de missionnaire dans son propre pays. Mort le 7 novembre 1717, il a
été béatifié par Léon XIII en 1893.
Antoine Baldinucci est né près de Florence et entra au
noviciat jésuite de Sant Andréa près de Rome en 1681.
Pendant ses études de théologie à Rome le père
Baldinucci se rendait souvent sur les places publiques pour engager ceux qui
venaient l’écouter à suivre les missions qui se donnaient dans différentes
paroisses des environs. Il continua cette façon de faire pendant le reste de sa
vie. Entre 1697 et 1717 il travailla dans 30 diocèses et donna en moyenne 22
missions par ans. Sa prédication était simple et vivante, parfois dramatique et
toujours efficace. Les gens reconnaissaient en lui un homme de prière et de
pénitence extraordinaire.
En 1697 il reçut sa première affectation : travailler
dans la paroisse jésuite à Frascati, près de Rome. Pendant 4 mois de l’année il
parcourait les villes et les villages des environs, en prêchant des missions.
Il continua ce travail pendant encore 20 ans, près de Frascati ou de Viterbo,
une ville au nord de Rome. Il marchait pieds nus pour accomplir ses missions,
quel que soit le temps; il portait un bâton de pèlerin en main et, dans un sac
à dos, ses notes et quelques objets pour le voyage. Ses missions duraient de 8
à 14 jours et portaient sur des sujets tirés des Exercices Spirituels de St
Ignace. Régulièrement il organisait des processions de pénitences qui préparaient
les fidèles au sacrement de réconciliation. Il terminait toujours ses missions
par un service de communion, où chacun recevait la communion. Pendant les
heures où il ne prêchait pas, il entendait des confessions ou enseignait le
catéchisme. A la fin de chaque mission il organisait un grand feu près de
l’église où on jetait des cartes à jouer, des dés, des chansons et des livres
mondains. D’autres fidèles déposaient des poignards et des pistolets aux pieds
du prêtre.
Sa dernière mission eut lieu à Pofi, où il arriva le
18 octobre 1717, déjà en très mauvaise santé. Le 26 octobre il devint tellement
faible qu’on l’obligea à se mettre au lit où il resta jusqu’au 7 novembre, date
de sa mort.
SOURCE : https://www.jesuites.com/antoine-baldinucci-sj/
Baldassare Franceschini (1611–1690), Ritratto di Antonio Baldinucci (Antonio Baldinucci (1665-1717) was a son of Filippo Baldinucci, a painter and author about arts in Florence. Antonio later became a Jesuit. He was beatified in 1893), circa 1681, pastel on cardboard, 43 x 38, Galería Palatina. Palazzo Pitti , Pitti Palace
Profile
Joined the Jesuits on 21 April 1681.
He taught in Rome and Terni, Italy. Ordained on 28
October 1695. Parish
missioner in the area of Colli Albani, Frascati and Viterbo, Italy, preaching 448 missions.
Noted for organizing processions during which Anthony and many of his flock
wore crowns
of thorns, and scourged themselves. His missions were
popular, drawing crowds so large that they had to be conducted outdoors;
Anthony employed a crowd control gang of thugs – and then converted them
all to the faith.
Also noted for his spread of devotion to the Blessed
Virgin Mary whose image was always carried on his missions.
Born
19 June 1665 in Florence, Italy
6
November 1717 of
natural causes
28
January 1873 by Pope Blessed Pius
IX
23 April 1893 by Pope Leo
XIII
Additional Information
Book
of Saints, by the Monks of
Ramsgate
Catholic
Encyclopedia, by T J Campbell
Saints
of the Society of Jesus
books
Our Sunday Visitor’s Encyclopedia of Saints
other sites in english
sitios en español
Martirologio Romano, 2001 edición
fonti in italiano
MLA Citation
“Blessed Anthony
Baldinucci“. CatholicSaints.Info. 4 May 2020. Web. 6 November 2021.
<https://catholicsaints.info/blessed-anthony-baldinucci/>
SOURCE : https://catholicsaints.info/blessed-anthony-baldinucci/
Blessed Antony Baldinucci, SJ (AC)
SOURCE : https://web.archive.org/web/20191030064240/http://www.saintpatrickdc.org/ss/1107.shtml
Francesco Galluzzi: Vita del P. Antonio Baldinucci della Compagnia di Giesù, missionario, Roma 1720
Bl. Anthony Baldinucci
Born 19 June, 1665, at Florence, died 6
November, 1717. He entered the Society of Jesus 21
April, 1681, and was ordained priest 28 October,
1695. After his third year of probation, he began his missionary career at
Monte Santo. The field of his labors were the towns of Frascati and Viterbo, in which, with
the exception of some more distant places, he labored for the rest of his life.
His methods of preaching were of the most unusual and startling character.
Splendid processions were
organized which proceeded from various parts of the country to the place where
the mission was being given. Many of the people wore crowns of thorns and
scourged themselves as they went along. When Baldinucci preached he frequently
carried a cross, and was loaded down with heavy chains. He often walked up and
down among the people scourging himself to blood. The exercises were usually
brought to a close by the burning in the public square of cards, dice, musical instruments,
etc. He always carried with him a miraculous picture
of the Madonna which
was borne before him as he proceeded from place to place. The propaganda
of devotion to the
Blessed Virgin was one of his special aims. To keep order among the
vast throngs who flocked to hear him, he always employed a number of laymen whom he
called deputati. They were not infrequently men of very bad lives
whom he chose purposely in order to conciliate and convert them. His
work among the clergy was
marked by great prudence and
success. Though his preaching was incessant, he found time to write two courses
of Lenten Sermons, to gather
materials for many more, compose hundreds of discourses, and carry on an
immense correspondence. The effect of his apostolic work upon
the excitable people among whom he worked was stupendous. At times, when
approaching a city, he found crowds covering the walls awaiting his arrival.
His particular methods are explainable as those best adapted to his
surroundings and times. After twenty years of labor, he died at the age of
fifty-two. He was already canonized in public
estimation, but, although the official ecclesiastical process
was begun in 1753, the decree of his beatification was
issued only on 23 April, 1893.
Sources
Goldie, Life of B. Anthony Baldinucci (London, 1894);
Vanucci, Vita del Beato A. Baldinucci (Rome, 1893); Galuzzi, Life of Baldinucci
(Rome, 1720); Budrioli, Summarium (Florence); Bartholomew Pace, S. J. (Baldinucci's
companion), Evidence, Sermon, p. 116.
Campbell, Thomas. "Bl. Anthony
Baldinucci." The Catholic Encyclopedia. Vol. 2. New York:
Robert Appleton Company, 1907. 6 Nov.
2021 <http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/02219b.htm>.
Ecclesiastical approbation. Nihil
Obstat. 1907. Remy Lafort, S.T.D., Censor. Imprimatur. +John M.
Farley, Archbishop of New York.
SOURCE : https://www.newadvent.org/cathen/02219b.htm
Saints of the Society of Jesus:
Blessed Anthony Baldinucci
Article
Father Anthony Baldinucci was born in Florence.
By his father’s advice he entered the Society of Jesus, in preference to the
order of Friars Preachers in imitation of his older brother. For more than
twenty years he evangelized as many as thirty dioceses of Italy, doing all that
a zealous apostle could accomplish for the salvation of souls, by preaching,
instituting pious sodalities, visiting the sick, and, when at home, passing his
time between the altar and confessional. Father Baldinucci was distinctively
one of the amiable saints, and seems to have resembled in character the good
Saint Francis Hieronymo. But, worn out by his labors, he expired before the
close of his fifty-second year, and was beatified by Pope Leo
XIII.
MLA Citation
Father D
A Merrick, SJ.
“Blessed Anthony Baldinucci”. Saints
of the Society of Jesus, 1891. CatholicSaints.Info.
28 December 2018. Web. 6 November 2021.
<https://catholicsaints.info/saints-of-the-society-of-jesus-blessed-anthony-baldinucci/>
SOURCE : https://catholicsaints.info/saints-of-the-society-of-jesus-blessed-anthony-baldinucci/
Blessed Anthony Baldinucci, SJ
Anthony Baldinucci
was born in Florence, Italy and at the age of eleven, began his studies at the
Jesuit school, San Giovannino. He thought of joining the Dominicans
in the footsteps of his older brother Philip, but because of his delicate
health, his father advised him to discern God’s will for himself and
recommended Anthony to make the Spiritual Exercises under a Jesuit’s direction.
The outcome of this retreat led Anthony to choose to follow St Ignatius and he
entered the novitiate of Sant Andrea on April 21, 1681.
Anthony spent the next fourteen years in Jesuit
training. He began his study of humanities at the Roman College in 1684 after
he pronounced his three simple vows. Then he taught at Terni and Rome between
1687 and 1690. After being in the Society for nine years, he had requested on
three occasions to serve foreign missions in India, China or Japan but each
request was turned down due to his uncertain health. In God’s wisdom, Anthony
was to be a missionary, not in any foreign country but in his own native land.
God was already preparing him for this role during his years studying theology
in Rome. During the three years, Anthony frequently spent Sunday afternoons in
the Roman public squares encouraging those gathered round to hear him, to
attend the missions then being held in the local Roman parishes. Little did he
know that such missions would one day be his main preoccupation. He was
ordained on October 28, 1695 and spent two more years completing his
tertianship.
Fr Baldinucci’s first assignment in 1697 was as
assistant parish priest in Frascati which was about twelve miles south of Rome
and part of his work involved spending four months of the year giving missions
in the surrounding cities, towns and villages. He did this for the next twenty
years traveling between Frascati and Viterbo in the north of Rome. He walked
barefoot regardless of the weather to each mission assignment, carrying his bag
with notes and personal belongings over his back and a pilgrim’s staff in his
hand. When asked why he walked barefoot, he replied:” That God may be moved by
my sufferings to touch the hearts of my hearers.”
His missions lasted from eight to fourteen days
depending on the needs of the parish and his sermons were always based on the
meditations in St Ignatius’ Spiritual Exercises.
At every mission,
Fr Baldinucci would include a penitential procession to help prepare the
parishioners for confession and he would end each mission with a General
Communion service when everyone would receive the Eucharist. When
he was not preaching, Fr Baldinucci would be in the confessional or teaching
catechism to children or visiting the sick. At the end of each mission, he
would build a big bonfire outside the church in which playing cards, dice,
worldly books and songs were fed to the flames. On one such occasion, he
counted 240 daggers and small arms and 21 pistols laid at his feet. Fr
Baldinucci’s preaching was simple, vivid and dramatic at times but always
effective. During the twenty years between 1697 and 1717, he visited 30
dioceses and gave 448 missions, an average of 22 missions a year. He was a man
of deep prayer and extraordinary penance and many of the people claimed to
witness miracles from his intercession.
On Oct 18, 1717, Fr Baldinucci’s health started to
deteriorate when he arrived at Pofi to begin another mission and he had to be
confined to bed and although it improved after a few days, Fr Baldinucci knew
that death was imminent. On Nov 5 he received Viaticum and the last anointing.
The following day he grew more feeble and his speech became difficult in the
afternoon but those near him could still make out his constant prayer: “Jesus
and Mary, my hope.” He began to convulse through the night until the following
morning and finally at 11.00 am on the morning of Nov 7, 1717, Fr Baldinucci
who was only fifty-two surrendered his soul to his Saviour. The indefatigable
priest at his death had served the Society for thirty-five years and spent
twenty years as an active preacher in the Italian countryside.
Fr Baldinucci was beatified by Pope Leo XIII on March
25, 1893 and his memorial is liturgically celebrated on July 2.
SOURCE : https://www.jesuit.org.sg/nov-anthony-baldinucci-sj/
November 7: Blessed Antonio Baldinucci
Died Nov 7, 1717
In the village of Pofi in Lazio, blessed Baldinucci
Antonio, a priest of the Society of Jesus, devoted himself entirely to
preaching missions to the people.
He never despaired, even when he has big wishes
adverse and his heart and health are inversely proportional; that we have
touched in fate. God can do great things with the little that we have. He,
for example, is below the average stature, has frail health, falls ill more
often than not. Just a little mental effort for him to tilt, and even greater
commitment in teaching is enough to put him to bed for days and days. His
father, the famous Academic Bran, does not seem to skimp in Christian of his
five sons and even proves stingy with the Lord, when he asks these three: one
enters the Dominicans, the other becomes a secular priest, while the smaller and
sickly is Jesuit, dreaming of going missionary in China, Japan or India. This
dream never came to fruition, since health is found and the many who persecute
indisposition. Incredible to say, he was treated with tobacco, which was best
medicine the time could provide, even when used more for its medicinal virtues,
smoking was a pleasure.
Thus restored, but still unsuitable for the missions,
he was called to do missionary at home and become anitinerant preacher, which
is not a task of absolute rest, but that no longer needs the Jesuit frail, just
a high penny of cheese, who has acquired a momentum unexpected and astonishing
vitality, becoming even able to travel 70 kilometers a day. Begins to turn the
countries of central Italy as a Saltimbanco, equipped with an arsenal of shells
and disturbing: a skull under his arm to call everyone the ultimate destiny,
happiness or eternal damnation; a wake, that is a poetic composition that he
has composed music and a brother, to call his listeners to conversion; simple words
that go straight to the heart and awaken the faith. Certainly, he is a child of
his preaching time (we are in the early eighteenth century), which brought us
public flagellation, exhausting penance and terrifying presentations of eternal
damnation. Even nature seems to give strength to his preaching, as that summer
day when, wanting to explain that the number of souls who fall in hell is equal
to that of autumn leaves fall from trees, he invited his audience to observe l
‘Shade tree which is preaching. Just at that moment arrives folata a wind that
strips the tree almost completely, so that the leaves remained attached to the
branches can easily count. Some of his recommendations are still good for
today: “Of all that happens, take the good and let go of the bad …. You live
with a big heart and free from any tightness … .. I do not think at all
possible evils, but only to those who need an immediate remedy …. ” “Heaven, or
Heaven, or beautiful homeland” is the exhortation that never fails in his
sermons, even in that of 7 November 1717, delivered a Pofi (Frosinone). These
are the last words of Father Antonio Baldinucci, after which accascia:
stroncato from a heart attack, but mainly consumed by hard work, just 52 years.
Leo XIII has proclaimed blessed in 1893.
Author: Gianpiero Pettiti
SOURCE : https://theblackcordelias.wordpress.com/2008/11/07/blessed-antonio-baldinucci/
BALDINUCCI, ANTONIO, BL.
Jesuit and preacher of popular missions; b. Florence,
Italy, June 19, 1665; d. Pofio, Nov. 7, 1717. Baldinucci entered the famous
Jesuit novitiate of Sant' Andrea, Rome, on April 21, 1681. He was ordained on
Oct. 28, 1695. His precarious health led his superiors to refuse his repeated
requests to labor as a missionary in India. Instead he was assigned in 1697 to
mission work in the Italian provinces of Abruzzi and Romagna. During his
remaining 20 years Baldinucci preached 448 popular missions, one to two weeks
in length, traveling on foot (usually barefoot) from town to town. His
preaching manner was dramatic, impassioned, and extraordinarily successful. He
always carried with him a miraculous picture of the Madonna, and frequently
preached laden with chains or bearing a heavy cross. At times he scourged
himself publicly until blood flowed to obtain the conversion of hardened
sinners. His techniques, while startling, were effective for the audiences of
his day. He collapsed in October 1717 while serving the sick of his
famine-stricken area. Leo
XIII beatified him in 1893.
Feast: July 2 (Jesuits).
Bibliography: F. J. Corley and R. J. Willmes, Wings of Eagles : The Jesuit Saints and Blessed (Milwaukee,
WI 1941). F. M. Galluzzi, Vida del venerable padre Antonio Baldinucci,
missionero apostolico de la Compañia de Jesus (Mexico
City 1760). J. N. Tylenda, Jesuit Saints and Martyrs (Chicago
1998) 378–80. E. Lamalle, Dictionnaire d'histoire et de géographie ecclésiastiques, ed. A. Baudrillart (Paris 1912–) 6:337–339. C. Sommervogel, Bibliothèque de la
Compagnie de Jésus, 11 v. (Brussels-Paris 1890–1932) 1:828–829;
8:1733. Acta Sanctorum Nov. 3:723–742.
[F. A. Small]
Неизвестный автор. Антонио Бальдинуччи (XIX век).
Beato Antonio Baldinucci Sacerdote gesuita
Sec. XVII
Martirologio Romano: Nel villaggio di Pofì nel Lazio, beato Antonio Baldinucci, sacerdote della Compagnia di Gesù, che si dedicò interamente alla predicazione delle missioni al popolo.
Mai disperare, anche quando le circostanze della vita ci sono avverse e i grandi desideri che portiamo in cuore sono inversamente proporzionali alla salute che ci è toccata in sorte. Perché per Dio si possono fare cose grandi anche con quel poco di cui siamo dotati. Lui, per esempio, è di statura inferiore alla media, è gracile di salute, si ammala spesso e volentieri. Basta un piccolo sforzo mentale per mandarlo in tilt, e anche solo un maggior impegno nell’insegnamento è sufficiente a metterlo a letto per giorni e giorni. Suo padre, famoso Accademico della Crusca, non sembra lesinare nell’educazione cristiana dei suoi cinque figli e neppure si dimostra avaro con il Signore, quando di questi gliene chiede ben tre: uno entra nei Domenicani, l’altro diventa sacerdote secolare, mentre il più piccolo e malaticcio si fa Gesuita, sognando di andare missionario in Cina, in Giappone o nelle Indie. Sogni proibiti, visto la salute che si ritrova e le tante indisposizioni che lo perseguitano. Incredibile a dirsi, riescono a curarlo con il tabacco, che era il massimo che potesse offrire la medicina del tempo, quando ancora lo si utilizzava più per le sue virtù medicamentose che per il piacere di una fumata. Così ristabilito, ma pur sempre inadatto per le missioni, gli chiedono di fare il missionario in patria e di trasformarsi in predicatore itinerante, che non è propriamente un incarico di assoluto riposo, ma di cui non ha più bisogno il gracile gesuita, alto appena un soldo di cacio, che ha acquistato uno slancio inaspettato e una vitalità strabiliante, diventando capace di percorrere anche 70 chilometri al giorno. Comincia a girare i paesi dell’Italia centrale come un saltimbanco, dotato di un armamentario rustico e inquietante: un teschio sotto il braccio per richiamare a tutti il destino ultimo, la felicità o la dannazione eterna; uno “svegliarono”, cioè una composizione poetica che lui stesso ha composto e un confratello musicato, per richiamare i suoi ascoltatori alla conversione; parole semplici che vanno dritto al cuore e che risvegliano la fede. Certamente, la sua, è una predicazione figlia del suo tempo (siamo agli inizi del Settecento), che ha come contorno pubbliche flagellazioni, penitenze estenuanti, terrificanti presentazioni della dannazione eterna. Perfino la natura sembra dare forza alla sua predicazione, come quel giorno d’estate in cui, volendo spiegare che il numero delle anime che cadono nell’inferno è pari alle foglie che d’autunno cadono dagli alberi, invita il suo uditorio ad osservare l’albero all’ombra del quale sta predicando. Proprio in quel momento arriva una folata di vento che spoglia quasi completamente l’albero, al punto che le foglie rimaste attaccate ai rami si possono facilmente contare. Alcuni suoi consigli sono tuttavia ancora buoni per oggi: “Di tutto ciò che capita, prendete il buono e lasciate andare il cattivo….Vivete con un cuore grande e libero da ogni strettezza…..Non pensate a tutti i mali possibili, ma solo a quelli che hanno bisogno di un rimedio immediato…”. ”Paradiso, o paradiso, o bella patria” è l’esortazione che non manca mai nelle sue prediche, neanche in quella del 7 novembre 1717, pronunciata a Pofi (Frosinone). Sono le ultime parole di Padre Antonio Baldinucci, dopo le quali si accascia: stroncato da un infarto, ma soprattutto consumato dalle fatiche, ad appena 52 anni. Leone XIII lo ha proclamato beato nel 1893.
SOURCE : http://www.santiebeati.it/dettaglio/90402
BALDINUCCI, Antonio
di Alberto Merola - Dizionario Biografico degli
Italiani - Volume 5 (1963)
Lo stile delle missioni di campagna del B., che trovava precedenti nell'oratoria spirituale e nella pratica religiosa fortemente emotiva della tradizione gesuitica del '600 (e il B. si riferiva esplicitamente alla tradizione di Paolo Segneri), si basava, oltre che sulla diffusione degli esercizi spirituali per il clero contadino e delle congregazioni mariane (tra l'altro il B. diffuse il culto della Madonna "refugium peccatorum", della quale portava con sé sempre un'immagine che è conservata attualmente nella chiesa del Gesù di Frascati), soprattutto sulle processioni penitenziali. Su tali processioni ci restano numerose testimonianze, cosi come dell'utilità missionaria presso le popolazioni contadine, molto colpite anche dalla forza oratoria della predicazione del B., testimonianze raccolte per il processo di beatificazione conclusosi positivamente nel 1893 sotto il pontificato di Leone XIII.
Fonti e Bibl.: Sacra rituum: congreg....
Beatificationis et canonizationis Ven. servi Dei P. A. B. Positio super dubio
an sit signanda commissio introductionis causae in casu…, Romae 1726; F.
M. Galluzzi, Vita del P. A. B., Roma 1720; Beatificazionis et
canonizationis ven. servi Dei A. B., Romae 1869; P. Vannucci, Vita del
beato A. B., Roma 1893; Lettere inedite del B. A. B., a cura di L. Rosa,
Prato 1899; G. De Guibert, La spiritualité de la Compagnie de Jésus, Rome
1953, pp. 279, 282.
SOURCE : https://www.treccani.it/enciclopedia/antonio-baldinucci_%28Dizionario-Biografico%29/
