Venerated in Roman Catholic Church Name James Salomoni | Feast May 30 Died 1314, Forli, Italy | |
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Patronage cancer patients; invoked against tumors Major shrine Santi Giovanni e Paolo, Venice Similar People Giovanni Mocenigo, Pasquale Malipiero, Jacopo Tiepolo, Alvise I Mocenigo, Peregrine Laziosi | ||
Blessed James Salomoni (Italian: Giacomo Salomoni; 1231–1314) was an Italian Dominican priest, ascetic, and mystic who is venerated as a beatus by the Catholic Church.
Born in Venice into a noble family, Salomoni was brought up by his mother after his father died. His mother later became a Cistercian nun and he was then raised by his grandmother. He became a Dominican friar at the age of seventeen, and became prior of various places, including Forli, Faenza, San Severino, and Ravenna. But Forli was finally where he settled for the rest of his life.
He gained fame for healing paralytics and for his prophetic abilities, obtained through a state of religious ecstasy. He lived for 45 years at a convent in Forli, which considers him a patron and was called there the “father of the poor” (padre dei poveri). He also earned fame for being the person who received the confession of Carino of Balsamo, the murderer of Peter of Verona, and became his spiritual father.
Salomoni suffered from cancer for four years, but he was cured some time before his death. He died in Forli in 1314.
Veneration
In 1315, a brotherhood was founded to promote veneration for Salomoni. In 1526, his cult was approved for Forli, and around 1568 for Venice; Pope Gregory XV approved his cult for the Dominicans in 1622. Salomoni’s remains were conserved in a funereal urn at Forli, but in 1939, his relics were translated to Venice, in the basilica of Santi Giovanni e Paolo, to the Chapel of Blessed James Salomoni. A shrine was built to Salomoni at Saint Catherine of Siena Church (which is run by the Dominican Order) in Manhattan.
The oldest indult which Benedict XIV quotes in this connection is that granted by Clement VII to the Dominicans of the Convent of Forli, 25 January 1526, to celebrate the Mass of Blessed James Salomoni "as often during the year as their devotion may move them to do so" (Benedict XIV, De canonizatione de SS.)[1].