Saint Anthony Mary Zaccaria, priest, who to reform the morals of the faithful founded the Congregation of the Clerks Regular of Saint Paul, that is, the Barnabites, and passed to the Savior at Cremona in Lombardy.
Lifespan: 1502–1539
Beatified: 3 January 1890 by Pope Leo XIII
Canonized: 27 May 1897 by Pope Leo XIII, Vatican Basilica
Memoria liturgica: 5 July
To him we also owe the public Forty Hours devotion, with the exposition of the Most Blessed Sacrament, and the ringing of bells every Friday at three in the afternoon, recalling the hour of Christ’s death.
He was born in Cremona in 1502, and in only thirty-six years of life he carried the Church of the sixteenth century forward by a great stride.
In 1524 he received his degree in medicine at Padua. Returning to Cremona, however, he resolved to expound the Gospel and the Church’s teaching to young and old alike. He was ordained a priest in 1528.
As early as 1530 he founded the Clerks of Saint Paul, the Angelics of Saint Paul — the first instance of a congregation of sisters living outside the cloister — and the Married of Saint Paul, a group of married laypeople devoted to the Gospel.
Denounced as a heretic and rebel, Anthony Mary journeyed to Rome, where he was acquitted.
During a journey to Guastalla, his health gave way. He was brought to Cremona, where he died on 5 July 1539.