25/08/2026
Happy feast day of Saint Joseph Calasanz!
St Joseph Calasanz was born into a noble family in 1556 in the kingdom of Aragon, modern day Spain, and, after a university education in theology and law, was ordained a priest in 1583. When he moved to Rome, he founded the first ever free school for poor children in Europe in 1597. In 1617, Pope Paul V allowed Joseph to establish a religious congregation for the priests who lived in community and assisted at his school, known as the “Pauline Congregation of the Poor of the Mother of God of the Pious Schools,” or the Piarist. In 1621, the Piarists were elevated to a religious order by Pope Gregory XV, and named the “Order of Poor Clerics Regular of the Mother of God of the Pious Schools.” Joseph Calasanz died in 1648.
“Joseph Calasanz, wise interpreter of the signs of the times, considered education, given in a “brief, simple and effective manner” (cf. Constitutiones [1622], n. 216), the guarantee of success in the life of students and the leaven of social and ecclesial renewal. Moreover, he saw school as a new way of evangelizing and for this reason he wished religious and preferably priests to take on the task of teaching, committing themselves to offering the child an all-round culture, in which the religious dimension would be considered and lived in a profound manner. ” - JPII, Letter to the Piarist Fathers, 6/24/97
Image credit: Wiki Commons - Slovak National Gallery,
Saint Joseph Calasanz
Letter to the Piarist Fathers: https://www.vatican.va/content/john-paul-ii/la/letters/1990/documents/hf_jp-ii_let_19900820_sancti-berardi.html
