Deepertruth: Stand In The Gap With Us And Saint John of the Cross

Stand In The Gap With Us And Saint John of the Cross 12/14/2023

(15 August 1654 – 5 March 1739) Carlo Gaetano Calosirto was born on 15 August 1654 on the island of Ischia off the coast of Naples.

At the age of 16yrs, St John-Joseph joined the Franciscans wishing to live a life of poverty, austerity and prayer. At 20yrs and at his Superior’s request, he founded a friary in Piedmont and was later ordained a Priest. He also set up a convent community and became Master of Novices.

“Where there is no love put love … and you will find love”.

Self-denial is never an end in itself but is only a help toward greater charity—as the life of Saint John Joseph shows.

In his novitiate Saint John Joseph of the Cross exercised himself in humility and poverty according to the example of their holy Father St Francis, and strove to nourish the spirit of mortification and prayer in imitation of St Peter of Alcantara.

St. John Joseph exemplified the most sublime virtues, especially humility and religious discipline. He also possessed numerous gifts in the supernatural order, such as those of prophesy and miracles.

John Joseph was very ascetic even as a young man. At 16, he joined the Franciscans in Naples; he was the first Italian to follow the reform movement of Saint Peter Alcantara. John Joseph’s reputation for holiness prompted his superiors to put him in charge of establishing a new friary even before he was ordained.

Saint John Joseph of the Cross attained to so high a degree of perfection that, even before he was ordained a preist, he was commissioned with the building of a new convent. Wherever there was hard work to perform during the construction, he was the first at hand to do it