Feast Day

October 19

The Church celebrates Peter of Alcántara on October 19.

Peter of Alcántara

Peter of Alcántara

1499 ADOctober 18, 1562

Peter of Alcántara was a sixteenth-century Spanish Franciscan who ate once every three days and slept upright for a few hours a night. His Treatise on Prayer and Meditation was declared by Pope Gregory XV to have been written under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, and Teresa of Ávila praised it as a masterpiece of interior guidance.