Gerardo Cagnoli
Gerardo Cagnoli (c. 1267 – 29 December 1342) was an Italian Roman Catholic and professed religious from the Order of Friars Minor. He embarked on a long pilgrimage south where he passed through Rome and Naples before settling in Trapani and then on the slopes of Mount Etna for a long hermitage. He later entered the Franciscans and served in two of their Sicilian convents where he was known for having caused miracles in addition to his humble and simple childlike nature which people believed was one of the signs of his holiness. The Sicilian people revered Cagnoli as a saint after his death and the fame of his holiness spread throughout Italian regions as far north as Liguria. Pope Pius X confirmed his longstanding "cultus" in 1908. Life Gerardo Cagnoli was born circa 1267 in Valenza in the Alessandria province. His parents were wealthy nobles. His father died when Gerardo was ten years old. He cared for his widowed mother. who was suffered from tuberculosis and was at her bedside until she died in 1290 at the age of 40. His mother's death saw Cagnoli on his own and so he decided to give all his possessions to the