Saint Vincent Ferrer, Priest

Vincent Ferrer was born in Valencia in 1350 and entered the Dominicans at eighteen. He lived during the Great Western Schism, when rival popes divided Europe; he supported the Avignon line and served Benedict XIII, but in 1416, seeing that Benedict would not step down for the sake of unity, he publicly withdrew his support.

From 1399 he travelled through Spain, France, Switzerland and Italy as a preacher, followed by crowds of penitents; his preaching on the coming Judgment earned him the name “Angel of the Apocalypse.” According to his Lives, people of other languages understood him though he spoke only his own. Worn out, he died at Vannes in Brittany on 5 April 1419. He was canonized in 1455.