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The saints

St. Fidelis of Sigmaringen

The poor man’s lawyer who became a Capuchin and died preaching in Switzerland.

Feast: 24 April · 1577 to 1622 · Reformation and missions · Sigmaringen, Germany, and Seewis, Switzerland

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Wall painting of St. Fidelis of Sigmaringen in a Capuchin habit, holding a palm and a sword.

Photo: Andreas Praefcke, 2006. Wikimedia Commons, Public domain.

Home / The saints / St. Fidelis of Sigmaringen

Seewis, Switzerland, 1622

Mark Rey was a lawyer known for taking the cases of the poor, so people called him the poor man’s lawyer.1

Disgusted by the corruption around him, he left law and became a Capuchin friar, taking the name Fidelis.1

He gave his money to poor seminarians and the needy.

Patronage No official patronage we can cite yet. The Church remembers him as the first martyr of the Congregation for the Propagation of the Faith.

01St. Fidelis of Sigmaringen

Into danger

He nursed soldiers through an epidemic, and then was sent to preach in Switzerland.1

He knew he might be killed, and in 1622 he was attacked and killed after preaching at Seewis.1

Live it this week

Use your skill for someone who can’t pay

Fidelis was the poor man’s lawyer. This week, give one hour of your professional skill (taxes, a resume, a repair, legal advice) free to someone who could never afford it.

Notes

How we know · 1 source for this page
  1. Franciscan Media, Saint of the Day: “Saint Fidelis of Sigmaringen”. franciscanmedia.org. franciscanmedia.org

The Catholic Encyclopedia (1913) is in the public domain; we quote the New Advent edition. Texts of the Holy See are quoted briefly from vatican.va. Scripture: World English Bible, Catholic edition (public domain); Verse numbers are modern, with Douay-Rheims numbers in brackets where they differ. Photographs: Wikimedia Commons, credited under each image; full list on the photo credits page.

Lines in the narrator’s voice, without a note, are our reflection, not a historical claim. Stone & Incense restates Church teaching in plain words; our wording is not an official Church text. Report an errorCorrections.