Saint John Gualbert

Saint John Gualbert was a Florentine knight who, for the love of Christ, forgave his brother’s murderer and then became a monk. At Vallombrosa in Tuscany he founded a community from which the Vallombrosan Benedictine congregation grew, and all his life he fought simony, the buying and selling of Church offices. The Church commemorates him on July 12.

He was born in Florence into the noble Visdomini family. The year of his birth is not certain: 985 or 995 is given. When his elder brother Hugh was murdered, his father and the custom of the age demanded that John take revenge. According to tradition, he met the killer on Good Friday in a narrow passage. The man fell before him with his arms in the form of a cross and begged for mercy in the name of Christ, and John sheathed his sword, embraced him, and spared his life. The oldest Lives hand down this story in differing versions.

According to tradition, when he then prayed in the church of the Benedictine monastery of San Miniato in Florence, Christ on the crucifix bowed his head toward him. John entered that monastery. But when the office of abbot was taken by a man who, according to the monks, had bought it, John protested and left San Miniato. For some time he stayed among the hermits of Camaldoli, but he was more drawn to community life.

Around 1038 he settled with a few companions at Vallombrosa, in a wooded valley of the Apennines not far from Florence. The abbess of the nearby monastery of Sant’Ellero gave them the land, and John reluctantly accepted the office of abbot. The community lived by the Rule of Saint Benedict in strict poverty and in simple buildings, while lay brothers took care of matters outside the monastery. Ancient testimonies say that alongside prayer the monks cared for the surrounding forests. Pope Victor II approved the community, and during the founder’s lifetime further monasteries in Tuscany were founded or joined it, among them Passignano.

Although he was a monk, he lived for the concerns of the whole Church. Paul VI wrote that from Vallombrosa, as from a watchtower, he saw its pressing needs. Together with his monks he opposed simony and Nicolaism, that is, the breaking of celibacy by clergy, and especially Bishop Peter Mezzabarba of Florence, who was accused of having bought his office. In 1068, during these struggles, one of his monks, Peter, underwent the ordeal by fire; the Roman Martyrology commemorates him as Blessed Peter called Igneus, who passed through the fire unharmed.

John Gualbert died on July 12, 1073, in the monastery of Passignano and was buried there. Before his death he wrote to his brothers a letter about the bond of charity that is to unite them. Pope Celestine III enrolled him among the saints in 1193. In 1951 Pius XII made him patron of Italy’s forest guards, and in 1999 John Paul II wrote that the forgiveness John granted to his brother’s killer remains a very timely call today.