Conrad of Piacenza

Corrado Confalonieri ( Corrado da Piacenza, Conrad Placentinus, Conrad of Piacenza; * 13th century in Piacenza, † February 19, 1351 in Noto ) was an Italian hermit and Franciscan Tertiary. He is especially revered as a saint in Sicily, without having been formally canonized.

Life

The Confalonieri belonged to the noble city of Piacenza. Corrado married - his wife Eufrosine later joined himself to a monastery - and shared the lifestyle of his peers, in which the hunting played a major role. During a hunt in 1315, he had put an undergrowth fire to flush out game. The fire went out of control and destroyed fields and crops, barns and houses in the area. In the search for the guilty a poor man came under suspicion and should be executed. Thereupon Corrado presented the city of justice and was sentenced to pay with his entire fortune for the damage. Penniless, he left the city, joined the Third Order of St. Francis of Assisi in Calendasco in and walked as a penitent on pilgrimage. About Rome finally he came up to the southern tip of Sicily, where he lived as a hermit in Noto and the physically and mentally ill served. When he in 1351, during a prayer sinking, died, he was already in the odor of sanctity. He was interred in the main parish church of San Nicola Noto, his remains were soon revered as a miracle-working relics. For his life is shrouded in numerous legends associated with the Customs, join at his feast, February 19.