At the age of 35, he left his law career after a frustrating experience in which he was offered a bribe, which he rejected, as appropriate, but which meant a terrible disappointment in earthly justice: corruption, perks, games of interest, manipulation. Fidel – a name that he would acquire in religious life – began a very strong approach to God and decided to become a Capuchin friar. After receiving his vows in Freiburg (Germany), already a priest, he distributed his property among the poor and the diocese to which he was assigned. Fidel organized a fund to pay for the studies of poor seminarians.
May the brother who is far away return
In Freiburg he achieved the conversion of many Protestants, largely thanks to his “eloquent, good sense, conscientious” preaching, as some of his biographers testify. He left a great impression on the people when the cholera plague hit the city, as he dedicated himself day and night to assisting the sick. For the saint, the point was to make God present in those moments when it precisely “seems” that He is not there.