Today is the Feast of Albertus’ patron Saint, and whom we receive our name, Saint Albert.
Today, and this week we celebrate Saint Albert. The celebrations began Monday with the scarving of the Saint Albert statue in front of the Taglietela Academic Center and will continue throughout the week with a mass in celebration of Saint Albert, a lecture by Sr. Ann Willetts, and a birthday cake celebrating 800 years of the Dominican Tradition.
Saint Albert week was started by the college in 2012 by Sr. Anne Kilbride to pay homage to Saint Albert and celebrate his life as well as his legacy.
Albert was born about 1200 into the family of the counts of Bollstadt at Lauingen in Swabia. After studying in Bologna and Padua, he entered the recently founded Dominican order in 1223. For the next three decades, he studied and taught in Paris and Cologne, where the young Thomas Aquinas was among his students. In 1254, Albert was elected prior provincial of Germany and, soon after, was appointed papal theologian and named Bishop of Ratisbon. As Bishop he became known as “Boots the Bishop” since he walked everywhere to see those he ministered to as Bishop.
Yearning for academia, he resigned his episcopal appointment in 1262 and returned to Cologne for a life of prayer and study. Albert died in Cologne in 1280. According to a contemporary, Albert was a man “so superior in every science that he can fittingly be called the wonder and miracle of our time.” His encyclopedic writings include works on physics, geography, astronomy, chemistry, biology, philosophy and theology. A listing of his works can be found on the water wall in the Tagliatela Academic Center.
He was a major figure in introducing Aristotle to the Latin West and was instrumental in the acceptance of human learning as an essential handmaid to theology. In 1933, Albert was proclaimed a saint and doctor of the Church.