St. Vincent Ferrer was a Valencian Dominican friar, who gained acclaim as a missionary and a logician. He is honored as a saint of the Roman Catholic Church.
Background
Vincent was the fourth child of the nobleman Guillem Ferrer, a notary who came from Palamós, and wife, Constança Miquel, apparently from Valencia itself or Girona. Legends surround his birth. It was said that his father was told in a dream by a Dominican friar that his son would be famous throughout the world. His mother is said never to have experienced pain when she gave birth to him.
Education
He graduated as doctor of theology at Lerida in 1374, and his sermons in the cathedral of Valencia from 1385 onwards soon became famous.
Career
In 1367 he entered the Dominican order at Valencia, where he became professor of theology. In 1394 the antipope Benedict XIII made him his confessor and theologian to his court at Avignon, but five years later Vincent resigned to undertake missions. Travelling through Burgundy, southern France, Switzerland, northern Italy, and Spain, he attracted crowds everywhere and had notable success in winning Jewish converts. He was known for his religious poverty and austerity, including perpetual fasting, and was believed to have the gift of miracles.
In an effort to end the schism, he had tried twice to persuade Benedict to relinquish his papal claim. In 1412 he was one of nine judges who elected Ferdinand I king of Aragon, and he persuaded Ferdinand to cease supporting Benedict, thus helping to end the schism. He lived to see the election of Pope Martin V in November 1417, whereby the Great Western Schism was officially ended. The last two years of his life were devoted to preaching in northern France.
Vincent died on 5 April 1419 at Vannes in Brittany, at the age of sixty-nine, and was buried in Vannes Cathedral.