Biography

Saint Josseph Calasanz was born in 1557, in Peralta de la Sal, a Spanish town where the Catalonian Language was spoken, in Aragon territory, near the Catalonian Region. He was the eighth and the last son of an "infanzones" family, that is to say, a family that belonged to the Aragon low-rank nobility. His father was a blacksmith and became a major in Peralta. Until he was 11 years old, he received the first education in his town and then he went to Estadilla town, where he continued his studies of Humanities.

 

In 1571, he moves to the near City of Lleida where was the most famous university of the old Aragon Crown. To Lleida used to go students from Catalonia, Aragon and Valencia Regions, the three great communities that formed the Aragon Crown. Those students, following the Medieval customs, used to form groups according to the "nations". Calasanz was elected "prior" of the Aragon students. It was the first manifestion of the prestige and moral level that came from his personality.

 

In Lleida, Joseph calasanz studied Philosophy and Law. After that, he followed the Theological studies in Valencia and Alcala de Henares Cities and again Leida, where he got a Doctor title.

 

In 1583 he was ordained a priest, starting in this way his ecclesiastical career that took him to carry out different jobs in the Catalonian Region. During this period of his life, he spent several years in La Seu d'Urgell City, a city very near to the France boundary, being at that time very insecure and dangerous. In fact, Catalonia had at that time grave problems of banditri, being rather dangerous in the boundary zones because of the constant penetration of "Gascons and Hugonet" groups that caused the disorders that were common in the neighbor country, causing in the Catalonina Region all kinds of abuses and extorsions.

 

Joseph Calasanz had to live the insecurity and the dangers of those times that were even greater because of the absence of the Bishop in La Seu d'Urgell City. The Diocese was vacant during a long period of time. The lacking of a strong authority as the one the Bishop used to put into practice then, gave airs to any kind of missbehaviors.The job of Secretary of the Cathedral Chapter gave Calasanz great responsibilities of government that were reflected in ten letters written to the Vice-King of Catalonia, where he asked for urgent help to solve the anguished situation that zone was subjected to, where the bandits used to rob, make extorsions and murder without limits.

 

His vinculation to the Lleida Region was strenthened together with the carrying out of other jobs, such as Visitor of Tremp City, a city where there was a Domican Convent that taught reading and writing. Calasanz was then a young and tall man and with a strong physical body.Those natural aspects were together with a moral, intellectual and spiritual strength that he gave proofs during his whole life. In the tenacity Calasanz carried out his pedagogial work,we can find out, really, some herculean, gigantic realities that only a man of such extraordinary conditions could bear.

 

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