21 Oct – St Gaspar del Bufalo – “Il martello dei Carbonari… Hammer of Freemasons”

Today is not only the anniversary of the time travel scene in Back To The Future via the souped up Delorean, it is also, and more importantly the Feast of St. Gaspar del Bufalo (+1837), “Hammer of Freemasons”.

I have interest in St. Gaspar as one of my Roman patrons because I exercised ministry as a seminarian and then deacon at the basilica in Rome where he helped to found devotion to and the Confraternity of the Most Precious Blood at San Nicola in Carcere.   He had a tense relationship with the state (Napolean’s police were after him) and Masons tried mulitple times to assassinate him.

His answer to the French commissar asking him to sign his submission to emperor should be the motto of every pope and bishop requested to yield to the world:

“I can’t, I musn’t, I don’t want to.”

That’s how a Roman priest says ‘No’ when he wants to be talkative.”

It’s better in Italian.

‘Non posso, non debbo, non voglio!’

I wonder if Pius VII’s “Non debemus, non possumus, non volumus” didn’t come from St. Gaspar.

These days it’s more like, “Volumus! Possumus! Debetote etiam vos!

His tomb is in the little S. Maria in Trivio, tucked away behind where the more flashy Trevi Fountain is collocated.  His bronzen tomb is not set off by glass and the hand of the image of the saint is extended outward so that you can graps it.  It is quite moving.

It seems that St. Gaspar had ways that really could irritate, as many saints.  For example, he could sense satanic objects and would charge into peoples homes to sieze and destroy them no matter how well hidden.

When he was young, he grew up across the mighty Church of the Gesù where his father was a cook for the Jesuit college there.  When Gaspar was very young he had a malady of the eyes that threatened blindness.  He was cured through the intercession of St. Francis Xavier, whose tomb is in the Gesù.  As a priest of Rome he was critical of the Papal States which got him into hot water.

St. Gaspar, Hammer of Freemasons, pray for us.

My 1st class relic of St. Gaspar.

 

About Fr. John Zuhlsdorf

Fr. Z is the guy who runs this blog. o{]:¬)
This entry was posted in Saints: Stories & Symbols and tagged . Bookmark the permalink.

8 Comments

  1. rhig090v says:

    In my area of Western Ohio, St. Gaspar’s order, the Precious Blood Missionaries helped to settle our heavily Catholic area and still minister a number of parishes today. Their old seminary in Carthagena, OH is one of the most beautiful buildings I’ve ever seen. These were real mean and solidly orthodox. Until 1965 when that seminary closed and they went to the Chicago Theological Union. Since that time it’s been a vocational free fall for them and stunted faith for the lay in the parishes still held by the Precious Blood. Every time a parish or group of parishes is turned over to diocesan priests, almost always are they young and traditional pastors, and those parishes light on fire!

    The public schools in this area were staffed by the Precious Blood sisters well into the 1980s as well with a similar vocational free fall after the habits came off. But what a great legacy! Hopefully through the intercession of St. Gaspar, the Precious Blood can find their heritage again.

  2. Felipe says:

    My first pilgrimage to Rome was organized to follow in the footsteps of St Gaspar del Bufalo. It was planned by Fr Jeffrey R. Keyes (formerly C.PP.S.) who celebrates 30 years a priest this weekend. It was a life changing experience and St Gaspar is definitely a Saint I hope more people knew about. The baptistery where he was baptized even has a sign that lets people know that he was baptized there! San Gaspare Ora Pro Nobis!

  3. Felipe says:

    My first pilgrimage to Rome was organized to follow in the footsteps of St Gaspar del Bufalo. It was planned by Fr Jeffrey R. Keyes (formerly C.PP.S.) who celebrates 30 years a priest this weekend. It was a life changing experience and St Gaspar is definitely a Saint I hope more people knew about. The baptistery where he was baptized even has a sign that lets people know that he was baptized there! San Gaspare Ora Pro Nobis!

  4. Pingback: FRIDAY EDITION – Big Pulpit

  5. adriennep says:

    I would love to hear more about your impressive family of relics. They are so important in an age of disbelief. Also, isn’t the person who hands them on to another likewise significant?

  6. Sandy says:

    Oh, I love hearing about this Saint. I have a special, strong devotion to the Precious Blood. Is the Confraternity still in existence? I’ll have to search. We need him in these times, for sure!

  7. FranzJosf says:

    I, too, grew up near St. Charles Seminary of the Society of the Precious Blood. And I can’t exaggerate how many villages and small towns in northwest Ohio have enormous and glorious Catholic churches standing in the center.

    Here is the Precious Blood Seminary, now closed.

    https://www.google.com/search?q=precious+blood+seminary+carthagena+ohio&client=ms-android-sprint-us-revc&prmd=mnixv&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwikyMHQ1t7zAhUmhOAKHV6jBj0Q_AUoA3oECAIQAw&biw=360&bih=617&dpr=3#imgrc=V59Aj1w3__e10M&imgdii=DzDHE6LTV8Y8NM

  8. Boniface says:

    I’ve read that St. John XXIII visited St. Gaspar’s tomb a few months after Vatican Council II opened, asking for St. Gaspar’s intercession (and I had the privilege of visiting it myself, too). St. John XXIII once remarked that devotion to the Precious Blood is “the devotion for our times.”

    That old CPPS Ohio seminary that some here mentioned may be closed as a seminary per se, but the impressive building is now a retirement home and can still be visited, including its chapel that has a major relic of St. Gaspar (an entire arm bone, I think) on display.

Comments are closed.