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Saint Raymond of Peñafort crossing the sea on his cloak, holding a key, painted by Tommaso Dolabella in 1627

Saint Raymond of Peñafort

Gathered the popes’ scattered decrees into one book of Church law, and refused a see

Patron of
jurists
Western calendar
7 January
Orthodox calendar
Not kept

Raymond was a professor of canon law at Bologna who became a Dominican in 1222 and, with Saint Peter Nolasco, founded the Mercedarians to redeem Christian slaves. Gregory IX gave him the task of gathering the popes' decrees, repeated and contradicted across some twelve or fourteen collections, into one book, and ordered that Raymond's work alone be used in the schools; offered the archbishopric of Tarragona as a reward, Raymond refused it to remain a simple friar. Elected Master General of the Order in 1238, he travelled Europe on foot from one Dominican house to the next, and he died at Barcelona on 6 January 1275.

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