St.Kamil de Lellis

St. Kamil de Lellis

Camillus de Lellis

BIOGRAPHY

He came from Chieti in Abruzzo, Italy. He spent his youth among the soldiers and fell into a gambling addiction. In the service of the Venetian Republic, he fought against the Turks. After his conversion, he wanted to become a Franciscan, but due to an incurable wound in his leg, he ended up as a nurse in the hospital where he was being treated. Influenced St. Philip Neri became a priest and founded the religious society of Servants of the Sick. In it, he was an example to other confrères for the rest of his life.

BIOGRAPHY FOR MEDITATION

THE PLAYER WHO FIXED HIS GAZE ON THE CROSS

He was born on the 25th. 5. 1550 in the Abruza town of Bucchianico near Chieti, south of Pescara in central Italy. His brother, who would have been older, died as a baby many years before his birth, and so was virtually an only child. The pious mother of advanced age had little strength and watched Kamil’s restless nature with concern. His father did not stay at home much. As an imperial soldier, he became the commander of the garrison in the Adriatic port of Pescara years later.

At the age of 13, Kamil’s mother died, and his father took him in among the soldiers. He said he could not read or write, but he learned to play cards and dice passionately. At the age of 19, he too became a soldier with a service affiliation under Venice. About a year and a half after that, he was to join a military expedition against the Turks, which then won the naval battle of Lepanto, but without his participation. His father died near the port of Ancona, and Kamil still had an open wound on his right leg that did not want to heal. Because of this, instead of fighting, he went to a Roman hospital with terminally ill people. Even then, seeing the misery of others, he helped with the care of others during his treatment. He was treated for 9 months; his leg gradually healed. However, despite his efforts to help others, he remained too quarrelsome and unable to break free from his passion as a player, leading to his release at the end of 1571.

Kamil returned to the army and at the same time unsuccessfully tried his luck in the game as an addicted fanatic. He took part in the battles against the Turks in Dalmatia and Tunis. He was dismissed from the war in October 1574, and, having lost everything and become a beggar, he sought some occasional work at the age of 24. At the port of Manfredonia on Gargano in Apulia, he found it on the construction of a Capuchin monastery and with it a temporary home, because the Capuchins took it

To reasonable reproaches, he had a prompt reply: “A true soldier dies in battle, a sailor at sea, and a servant of the sick is to die with those whom he serves.” In Rome, Sixtus Hospital, 3,000 sufferers died of the plague in a short time, and therefore no one wanted to serve there. Kamil left with eight brothers. They found a foul smell, dirt, and five of them fell victim to the infection in a short time. Therefore, Kamil incredibly increased his performance and worked even when he wasn’t supposed to. Filling straw bales was among the necessary work he also did there. The rotten and defiled had to be replaced with clean ones, which someone had to fill with straw and cover. Kamil is even said to have sewn blankets. He was a shining example of the principles to which he led his brothers. In 1607, he renounced the position of superior so that he would be all the more a servant of the sick, although he did not stop being sick.

In addition to a 40-year unhealed ailment in his leg, he had a painful hernia, to which he helped himself in the service of the terminally ill, and hid other diseases from doctors only out of fear that doctors would urge the need to save. When he couldn’t help, he endured his suffering, pleased others, and showed his kindness to everyone, at least with a word. He was taken to the order’s hospital among the poor suffering. He remembered with gratitude that he had been saved from the hellish punishment he would have deserved in his youth. With a lovingly crowded heart, he died blissfully after the last of 33 illnesses. He was buried in the monastery church of St. Magdalene’s near the Pantheon. God glorified him with miracles. Pope Benedict XIV. Ho 7. 4. 1742 beatified and 29. On 6 June 1746, he was canonized. In 1886, he became the patron saint of the sick and dying, and in 1930, Pope Pius XI appointed him patron of all nurses and other nursing staff.

RESOLUTION, PRAYER

St. Kamil also encouraged his brothers with the words of Christ: “Whatever you did to one of these poor ones, you did to me.”(Mt 25,40) I will reflect on that statement, and perhaps recall the opposite part of it in verse 45: “Amen, I say to you, whatever you have not done to one of these …”

God, You gave the holy priest Kamil a precious gift of compassion for the sick and dying; for his merits, pour the spirit of your love on us too, that we may serve You in our neighbors and reach You safely at the hour of death. Through Your Son Jesus Christ, our Lord, for He lives and reigns with You in the unity of the Holy Spirit throughout all the ages of ages.