This morning I had the privilege of singing the chant for a Solemn High Mass in the cathedral of Lincoln, Nebraska. It was a feast for which I had never sung before: that of St. Camillus de Lellis (1500–1614). The texts of the Mass itself made me want to learn more about him.
A soldier and a gambler, Camillus experienced a profound religious conversion that led him to attempt to join the Capuchins. Refused admission due to an incurable leg wound, he moved to Rome, took as his spiritual director St. Philip Neri, and dedicated himself to the unstinting care of the sick, whose wretched abandonment he witnessed firsthand. He was eventually ordained to the priesthood by the last surviving Catholic bishop of Great Britain, Lord Thomas Goldwell, in 1584.
Camillus established a religious congregation, the Order of Clerks Regular, Ministers of the Infirm (also known as Camillians), devoted to the care of the sick—above all, the dying. Like so many other Counter-Reformation saints, he ministered tirelessly to plague victims. In 1591, the Order adopted a fourth religious vow: “to serve the sick, even with danger to one’s own life.”
