St. Charles Borromeo

St. Charles Borromeo was born in 1538 in the family castle at Arona on Lake Maggiore in northern Italy, the son of a noble family related to the Medici. When his uncle was elected Pope Pius IV in 1559, the twenty-one-year-old Charles was called to Rome, created a cardinal, and entrusted with major responsibilities in the papal government. In that role he became one of the driving forces behind the reconvening and successful conclusion of the Council of Trent (1562-63), and he supervised the writing of the Roman Catechism that carried the Council's teaching to parish priests. The sudden death of his elder brother in 1562 deepened his conversion. Rather than leave the clerical state to continue the family line, as many expected, Charles was ordained a priest and then a bishop in 1563. Named Archbishop of Milan, he insisted on actually residing in his diocese — the first resident archbishop Milan had seen in roughly eighty years — and set about making it a model of Catholic reform. He held synods and councils, founded seminaries for the education of clergy, established the Confraternity of Christian Doctrine to catechize children, and reformed religious communities with a rigor that once provoked an attempt on his life. His holiness showed most clearly during the plague that struck Milan in 1576-77. While civil authorities fled, Charles remained in the city, organized food and care for tens of thousands, went into debt to feed the starving, and personally ministered to the sick and dying. He lived austerely, giving away much of his considerable income, and wore himself out in constant visitation of his vast diocese. He died in Milan on the night of November 3, 1584, at the age of forty-six, and was canonized in 1610 by Pope Paul V. His feast is kept on November 4, and his tomb in the crypt of Milan's cathedral remains a place of pilgrimage. As a bishop who embodied the Council of Trent's vision of a shepherd close to his people, he is the patron of bishops, seminarians, and catechists.