What St. Fidelis teaches us about the horror of Heresy.
- Roland Flores
- Apr 24
- 7 min read
Ave Maria! May Our Lady of Good Counsel, the Immaculate Queen of Heaven, together with St. Joseph, St. Fidelis, and St. Peter Martyr, pray for us! Today, 24 April, the Church commemorates The Capuchin Father Fidelis the Martyr. Let’s take a look at the life of this grand martyr and what he can teach us about heretics.
The life of St. Fidelis.
Our St. Fidelis was born in SIgmaringen in Southern Germany in 1577, where he practiced law until he became disenfranchised with the world and entered a Capuchin Monastery. His superior gave him the religious name "Fidelis" or faithful referring to scriptural texts: "Fear none of those things which thou shalt suffer. Behold, the devil will cast some of you into prison that you may be tried: and you shall have tribulation ten days. Be thou faithful until death: and I will give thee the crown of life" (Revelation 2:10). St. Fidelis was ordained a priest and said his first Mass on 4 October 1612, the feast of St. Francis. St. Fidelis was almost immediately sent to preach and hear confessions. He later became guardian of the Capuchin friary in Weltkirchen, Austria. During a severe epidemic St. Fidelis fearlessly cared for and miraculously cured many sick soldiers. Many souls reformed their lives by St. Fidelis' zealous labors, and many Protestants were converted. This success against calvinism was noticed and the Congregation of the Doctrine of the Faith commissioned St. Fidelis to preach in the Graubünden, Switzerland, a Calvinist stronghold. St. Fidelis, along with 8 other Capuchins, arrived and created a Mission that had great success. This angered the Calvinist, who began threatening St. Fidelis and threatening to destroy the Catholic Mission. On 24 April 1622,St. Fidelis made his confession, Said Mass and then preached at Grüsch. At the end of his sermon, which he had preached with more than ordinary zeal, he stood silent all of a sudden, with his eyes fixed upon Heaven, in ecstasy. On 24 April, in a campaign organized by the Habsburgs, St. Fidelis was preaching under protection of some Austrian imperial soldiers in the Church at Seewis with the aim of reconverting the people of Seewis to Catholicism. During the sermon, his listeners were called to arms by the Calvinist agitators outside and began a confrontation with the Austrian troops outside the church. A musket was fired at St. Fidelis but did not hit him. St. Fidelis was then removed by the faithful from the Church. St. Fidelis then fled and ordered his friars and the Austrian guards to do the same. St. Fidelis then returned alone to Seewis and was confronted by a mob of Calvinists led by the minister, who demanded that he renounce the Catholic faith. He answered: "I am sent to you to confute, not to embrace your heresy. The Catholic religion is the faith of all ages, I fear not death." This angered the crowd and one of the calvinist beat him down to the ground by a stroke on the head with his backsword. Despite this St. Fidelis rose again on his knees, and stretching forth his arms in the form of a cross, said: "Pardon my enemies, O Lord: blinded by passion they know not what they do. Lord Jesus, have mercy on me. Mary, Mother of God, succor me!" Another sword, some say a club, struck his skull, and he fell to the ground in a pool of his own blood. The soldiers, not content with this, added many stab wounds to his body with their long knives, and hacked-off his left leg, as they said, to punish him for the many times he went to preach to them. His body was found by Faithful who said his eyes were open, fixed on the heavens. He was buried the next day. The Protestant minister who had led St. Fidelis' murder later converted and made a public renunciation of Calvinism. After six months, the St. Fidelis' body was found to be incorrupt. His relics are kept under the hgh altar at the Coire Cathedral and the Capuchin church at Weltkirchen, Austria. The Calvinists would stage a revolt that same year but were defeated by the imperial troops who had petitioned St. Fidelis the martyr. Pope Benedict XII would beatify him in 1729 and Pope Benedict XVI would Canonized St. Fidelis named 24 April as his feast day in 1746.
What St. Fidelis teaches us about the horror of Heresy.
Today, there are many who wish to align themselves with Heretics against their political enemies or for some other wordly venture. Granted, in our present situation with the current antichristian campaigns all around us, it is tempting to want some sort of solidarity with all those who call themselves christians. Alas, St. Fidelis comes to our aid, not only through the virtue of his martyrdom but through his preaching. St. Fidelis is said to have mentioned this motto often in his preachings: "Woe to me if I should prove myself but a halfhearted soldier in the service of my thorn-crowned captain." Our allegiance is to Christ and therefore our goals must be the Glory of God and the salvation of souls, starting with our own. "Seek ye therefore first the kingdom of God, and his justice, and all these things shall be added unto you' (Matthew 6:33). Christ Himself in many places warns of heretic clerics. "And many false prophets shall rise, and shall seduce many" (Matthews 24:11). The Apostles also warned the faithful not to fall into the error of solidarity of those who do not hold the apsotilc faith. "I wonder that you are so soon removed from him that called you into the grace of Christ, unto another gospel. Which is not another, only there are some that trouble you, and would pervert the gospel of Christ. But though we, or an angel from heaven, preach a gospel to you besides that which we have preached to you, let him be anathema. As we said before, so now I say again: If any one preach to you a gospel, besides that which you have received, let him be anathema" (Galtians 1:6-10). Here we see so clearly the sanctity of St. Fidelis, who zealously sought to rescue those poor souls ensnared in the heresy of Calvinism. He did not recommend an alliance with them against the Turks, who were invading Poland but instead he gave us the perfect example of rebuking heresy out of a love of Neighbor. Similarly, just five days after the feast of St. Fidelis, the Church commemorates St. Peter Martyr. The Dominican Father St. Peter Martyr was killed on 29 April 1252, for his preaching against the Cathars Heresy in northern Italy.
St. Peter was also struck in the head with a dagger, some say an axe, and fell to the ground. St. Peter also rose to his knees and recited the first article of the Apostles' Creed and dipped his fingers in his blood to write on the ground the word Credo. Much like our St. Fidelis, the murderer of St. Peter OP was also converted and later became a Dominican Friar. Two wonderful Martyrs, celebrated so close together call to mind the words Pope Innocent IV wrote regarding St. Peter the Martyrs: "The truth of the Christian Faith, manifested, as it has been, by great and frequent miracles, is now beautified by the new merit of a new Saint—Lo! a combatant of these our own times comes, bringing us new and great and triumphant signs." Pope Leo X remarks these words in is Encyical Exsurge Domine 1520 conemnding the errors of Luther: "Let all this holy Church of God, I say, arise, and with the blessed apostles intercede with almighty God to purge the errors of His sheep, to banish all heresies from the lands of the faithful, and be pleased to maintain the peace and unity of His holy Church." Today there are many prostant sects, perhaps millions, who all share one definite truth, that they are against the Church established by CHrist. "For such false apostles are deceitful workmen, transforming themselves into the apostles of Christ. And no wonder: for Satan himself transformeth himself into an angel of light. Therefore it is no great thing if his ministers be transformed as the ministers of justice, whose end shall be according to their works" (2 Corinthians 11:13-15). However, despite the overt desire of the enemies of God for all Denominations and faiths to be one, the unfortunate situation is that any individual that professes heresy, does not have faith. "Look to yourselves, that you lose not the things which you have wrought: but that you may receive a full reward. Whosoever revolteth, and continueth not in the doctrine of Christ, hath not God. He that continueth in the doctrine, the same hath both the Father and the Son" (2 John 1:8-9). Here in St. John's warning we find the key word and the underlying problem with aligning ourselves, even just politically, with heretics. That is the word "revolteth." That is, it is impossbile to be in an alliance with someone whose entire "religion" exists because it is against Christ and His Church. So to put it simply, it’s impossible for Protestants, or any heretics, to be our allies in matters of faith, morals or politics. I will close with the wise words of Dom Prosper Gueranger's. In Gueranger's Liturgical year, we find these words in St. Fidelis chapter: "Protestantism was established and rooted by the shedding of torrents of blood; and yet Protestants count it as a great crime that, here and there, the children of the true Church made an armed resistance against them. The heresy of the sixteenth century was the cruel and untiring persecutor of men whose only crime was their adhesion to the old faith—the faith that had civilized the world. The so-called Reformation proclaimed liberty in matters of religion, and massacred Catholics who exercised this liberty, and prayed and believed as their ancestors had done for long ages before Luther and Calvin were born. A Catholic who gives heretics credit for sincerity when they talk about religious toleration proves that he knows nothing of either the past or the present. There is a fatal instinct in error which leads it to hate the Truth; and the true Church, by its unchangeableness, is a perpetual reproach to them that refuse to be her children. Heresy starts with an attempt to annihilate them that remain faithful; when it has grown tired of open persecution it vents its spleen in insults and calumnies; and when these do not produce the desired effect, hypocrisy comes in with its assurances of friendly forbearance. The history of Protestant Europe, during the last three centuries, confirms these statements; it also justifies us in honoring those courageous servants of God who, during that same period, have died for the ancient faith."
References:
Exsurge Domine -Condemning the Errors of Martin Luther by Pope Leo X - 1520.
April 24 – St. Fidelis of Sigmaringen, Martyr ~ Dom Prosper Gueranger.
April 29 – St Peter the Martyr ~ Dom Prosper Gueranger.
Saint Fidelis of Sigmaringen (24 April): Butler's Lives of the Saints
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