March 16: Blessed Torello of Poppi

A Hermit for the Love of God

In the volume I lustri antichi e moderni della Città di Forlì one reads:

“Although born in Tuscany, he has been recognized as a shoot from the Forlì tree by the Sacred Congregation of Rites itself on January 28, 1752, in the decree by which it granted the Mass and the Office to the City of Forlì, which in the present year 1755, with the unanimous votes of the Councillors, acclaimed him as one of its Protectors.”

The reference is to Blessed Torello, born in the Tuscan town of Poppi (Casentino area) in 1202 to an upper class family. Various sources speak of him, including the Anonymous Vita, the compendium by Gerolamo da Raggiuolo, and a vernacular Vita attributed to his disciple Pietro.

Left an orphan at an early age, he lived in idleness and dissipation until about the age of 18 to20. Then he converted into the faith and went to the Vallombrosan monastery of San Fedele in Poppi. After confessing to the abbot, he chose to lead a life of penance, withdrawing into solitude in the forests of Casentino, in the hermitage of Avellaneto.

He remained in the hermitage for more than sixty years, praying and doing penance, surrounded by nature and animals, and even performing several miracles. One of the most famous stories recounts how he tamed a terrible wolf.

Sensing that his death was near, he returned to the monastery of San Fedele to receive the final Sacraments. Although both the monks and the inhabitants of Poppi asked him to remain at the abbey, he returned to his hermitage, where he died on March 16, 1282. It is said that the bells of Poppi rang by themselves to announce his death. The inhabitants then ran to the hermitage to take care of his body. He was buried in the monastery of San Fedele and invoked as the Patron of Poppi.

On March 7, 1761, Pope Benedict XIV confirmed Blessed Torello as co-patron of Forlì.