Alphonsus Maria de Liguori

Alphonsus Maria de Liguori was born on 27 September 1696 at Marianella, a village near Naples in the Kingdom of Naples. He was the eldest of seven children of Giuseppe de Liguori, a Neapolitan nobleman and captain of the royal galleys, and Anna Maria Cavalieri. Given a careful religious and classical education, he took doctorates in both civil and canon law at the University of Naples at the age of sixteen and entered upon a successful career as an advocate. After some eight years at the Neapolitan bar, the loss of an important case through an oversight of his own prompted him to abandon the legal profession. A period of prayer and retreat followed, during which, against the determined opposition of his father, he resolved to become a priest.

He was ordained on 21 December 1726 and soon devoted himself to apostolic work among the poor of Naples, preaching in the streets and in hospices for the destitute and spending long hours in the confessional. In November 1732, at Scala on the Amalfi coast, he founded the Congregation of the Most Holy Redeemer, whose members, known as Redemptorists, were to give parish missions especially in the neglected countryside of the kingdom. The institute's early years were marked by the departure of several companions and by disputes over its rule, yet Alphonsus persevered in preaching missions and in forming those who remained. He became known for a simple, direct style of preaching and for a pastoral approach that sought to encourage rather than to terrify.

In 1762 Pope Clement XIII named him Bishop of Sant'Agata dei Goti. Alphonsus accepted the appointment only under papal command. As bishop he carried out visitations, reformed the seminary, insisted that clergy reside in their parishes, and continued to write. His principal theological work, the Theologia Moralis, went through multiple editions and was distinguished by its effort to steer a middle course between Jansenist rigorism and the more lax opinions then current. He also published widely read books of devotion, including The Glories of Mary, Visits to the Blessed Sacrament, Uniformity with God's Will, and a version of the Stations of the Cross. A gifted musician, he composed hymns still sung in Italy, among them the Christmas song Tu scendi dalle stelle. Rheumatoid arthritis, which had afflicted him for years, left him increasingly crippled and bent almost double.

In 1775, because of his failing health, he was allowed to resign the diocese and retired to the Redemptorist community at Pagani (then Nocera de' Pagani). His final decade was one of intense physical pain, near blindness, and spiritual trial. A version of the congregation's rule approved by the Neapolitan court, which he signed under pressure in 1780, was rejected by Redemptorist houses outside the kingdom and led to a painful division; for a time he was even regarded as no longer superior of his own institute. He endured these trials with patience and died at Pagani on 1 August 1787 at the age of ninety.

Alphonsus was beatified by Pope Pius VII in 1816 and canonized by Pope Gregory XVI in 1839. Pope Pius IX proclaimed him a Doctor of the Church in 1871, and Pope Pius XII later named him patron of confessors and of moral theologians. His feast is celebrated on 1 August. He remains one of the most influential Catholic moralists of the modern period, and the Redemptorist congregation he founded continues its missionary work in many countries.