This patriarch of Western monasticism was born at Nursia, in central Italy, about 480. In his youth, seeing the corruption in the world, he left home to live a hermit’s life of penance and prayer in a cave in the mountain of Subiaco, near Rome, where he was instructed in Christian asceticism by Romanus, a Solitary of the vicinity.

Benedict’s reputation for sanctity gathered a large number of disciples around him, for whom he erected monasteries in which they lived a community life under a prescribed rule. In the year 529, he left Subiaco for Monte Cassino, and there founded the great Abbey which became the center of religious life in Europe.

The principles of the Rule written by Saint Benedict became the basis of religious life for all Western religious orders and congregations after his time. It shows the ways to religious perfection by the practice of self-conquest, mortification, humility, obedience, prayer, silence, retirement, and detachment from the world.

Saint (and Abbot) Benedict died March 21, 543 as he stood before the altar of Monte Cassino immediately after receiving Holy Communion. Benedict had a twin sister, Scholastica, who lived in a nearby Monastery. She presided over a monastery of nuns near Monte Cassino.