Blessed Bartolo Maria Longo
Feast Day: October 5
This apostle of the rosary had flirted with Satanism in a sect in Naples, Italy, but through a friend came back to the Catholic faith as a Third-Order
Dominican.
He practiced the law and made a vow of chastity.
However, he became friends with a countess whose children he tutored, began to administer her properties, and married her in 1885 on the advice of Pope Leo XIII.
In the 1870s, Bartolo had a mystical experience in which Mary asked him to promote devotion to the rosary.
He published religious tracts, founded a women’s religious order, advocated on behalf of prisoners, and built a popular shrine in Pompeii to Our Lady of the Rosary.
