Joseph Calasanz
September 11, 1557 — August 25, 1648 · Feast day: August 25
Joseph Calasanz was an Aragonese priest who made the education of poor children the work of his life. After studying law and theology and serving the Church in Spain, he moved to Rome in 1592. There he saw children growing up without schooling and, in 1597, opened a free school in the Trastevere district. The small beginning became the Pious Schools and the Piarist order, the first religious institute devoted chiefly to teaching. Calasanz insisted that learning and Christian formation belonged together and that poverty should not bar a child from either. His long service was tested by opposition and internal conflict; the Piarist order was suppressed in 1646, shortly before his death, then restored after his lifetime. He died in Rome in 1648, was canonized in 1767, and was named patron of Christian popular schools by Pius XII in 1948.