Portal:Catholic Church/Patron Archive/June 19 2007

Saint Romuald (c. 951–June 19, 1027) was the founder of the Camaldolese order.

He was born in Ravenna, Italy, to the aristocratic Onesti family. As a youth, Romuald supposedly indulged in the "pleasures" and sins of the world common to a 10th century nobleman. After watching his father, Sergius, kill an opponent in a duel, however, the 20-year old Romuald was devastated, and fled to the Abbey of Sant'Apollinare in Classe in Venice. After some indecision, Romuald became a monk there. Led by a desire for a stricter way of life than he found in that community, three year later he withdrew to become a hermit on a remote island in the region, accompanied solely by an older monk, Marinus.

Apparently having gained a reputation for holiness, the Doge Pietro Orseolo of Venice accepted his advice to become a monk, abdicating his office, and fleeing in the night to Catalonia to take the monastic habit. Romuald and his companion, Marinus, accompanied him there, establishing a hermitage near the Abbey of Sant Miguel de Cuxa which Orseolo entered.

In his youth Romuald get acquainted with the three major school of western monastic tradition. Sant' Apollinare in Classe was a traditional Benedictine monastery under the influence of the Cluniac reforms. Marinus followed a much harsher, asketic hermit lifestyle that was originally of Irish eremitic origins. The abbot of Sant Miguel de Cuxa, Guarinus also began reforms but mainly building upon the Hispanian Christian tradition. Romuald was able to integrate these different traditions and establish his own monastic order.

A friend of the Emperor Otto III, Romuald was persuaded by him to take the office of abbot of an ancient monastery to help bring about a more dedicated way of life there. The monks, however, resisted his reforms, eventually causing Romuald to resign his office, hurling his abbot's staff at Otto's feet in total frustration. He then again withdrew to the hermit life. He was drawn, though, throughout his life to help in the establishment of monasteries and hermitages throughout Italy. The most prominent of these are the hermitages of Fonte Avellana (around 1012) and Camaldoli (around 1023), both located in Tuscany. Romauld founded several other monasteries, including the monastery of Val di Castro, where he died in 1027.
Attributes:white habit with ladder to heaven, book and skull
Patronage: sickness of the eyes
Prayer: