Bl. Torello

One day, as a dissolute youth of Poppi, Italy named Torello was playing a game with friends, a cock flew onto his arm and crowed three times. Seeing this incident as a sign from God, Torello hastened to a nearby monastery to confess his sins. Thereafter he became a hermit of great holiness. Once, as a mother was washing clothes, with her three-year-old son beside her, a wolf seized the boy in its jaws and ran off. Screaming, the mother rushed after the animal. The wolf then stumbled into Torello’s cell. Instantly the hermit commanded the beast by the authority of God to put down the boy. The wolf thereupon laid the child at Torello’s feet. Torello then commanded the wolf never to attack anyone again. The hermit now prayed over the nearly lifeless boy. When the frantic mother reached Torello’s cell, she found her son safe and sound. On another occasion, a mother with two gravely ill sons threw herself at Torello’s feet, begging him to intercede for them. Torello prayed: “My omnipotent Lord…succor these boys; mend, O Lord, the sorrow of their afflicted mother, and by reason of her faith, console her grief, and deliver her sons.” Both boys were healed.