Leoluca

Saint Leoluca
Votive image of St. Leoluca
Abbot
Born	~815 Corleone, Sicily
Died	~915
Venerated in	Roman Catholic Church Eastern Orthodox Church
Major shrine	San Leoluca Church, Corleone
Feast	March 1
Patronage	Corleone, Sicily; Vibo Valentia, Calabria

Saint Leoluca, also Leone Luca, Leo Luke of Corleone, or Luke of Sicily (c. 815 – c. 915) was the Abbot and Wonderworker of the Monastery of Mount Mula in Calabria, and a founder of Italo-Greek monasticism in southern Italy. He is venerated as a saint in the Roman Catholic and Eastern Orthodox churches.

Born in the Sicilian town of Corleone, he died about a hundred years later, after eighty years of monastic life, in Monteleone Calabro, now Vibo Valentia in Calabria. Today he is a patron saint of both towns, and his feast day is celebrated on March 1.

Saint Luke was born in Corleone, Sicily in the 9th century AD (c.815 to 818 AD), on the eve of the Saracen invasion of Sicily. His parents Leo and Theoktiste baptized him Leo, in honour of his father. They were a pious and wealthy family who raised him in the nurture and admonition of the Lord. He was orphaned at an early age when his parents died, and devoted himself to managing the estate and supervising the herds as a shepherd. In the solitude of the fields he realized that he had a call to religious life, so he sold the estate, gave the money to the poor, and went to the monastery of St. Philip in Agira, in the province of Enna, Sicily.

It is not known how long he stayed at the monastery at Agira, but due to the raids of the Saracens, he left from there and went to Calabria. Before going to Calabria however, he made a special point of going on pilgrimage to visit the tombs of Saint Peter and Saint Paul in Rome.