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Camillus DeLellis

From Gambler to Servant of the Sick

BY C AROL M. H ARRISON

n nursing history, certain names or similarly marked.1 She was somewhat tendent assigned him to serve the sick groups seem to predominate in the pessimistic about the dream; she imag- but, because of his temper and passion Iliterature. Women who contributed ined that the crosses represented dreary for gambling, he ignored their suffering to nursing include Fabiola, Florence omens of some great disaster to her and neglected their needs. Needless to Nightingale, Dorothea Lynde Dix, house and family. Little did she know say, the superintendent dismissed him Louisa May Alcott, Harriet Tubman, that the son she bore would become a even before his leg was healed. Linda Richards and Clara Barton. true warrior in the army of Christ after Camillus returned to war. Prominent groups include religious being a soldier of fortune, inveterate After reenlisting, a memorable orders of sisters, the nursing orders gambler and wandering beggar. voyage from Palermo to Naples during the Crusades and the Knights of With a violent temper to match his changed the course of his life. Most of St. Lazarus. formidable six-foot, six-inch frame, his fellow soldiers died at sea during a However, few of us know about the Camillus detested school, became fierce storm. Camillus and a few others life of Camillus De Lellis, who focused addicted to gambling and seldom prayed survived. When they finally arrived on his efforts on preparing nurses to care or received the sacraments. Gambling, land, Camillus and his companions for the poor, the imprisoned and the complicated by his uncontrollable were discharged. He continued to dying. After a rowdy early life, he expe- temper, became a way of life. Camillus gamble, eventually losing all he owned. rienced a major conversion, eventually and his father fell ill while fighting After begging on the street, he was founding a religious order devoted to against the Turks six years after the offered a job as a laborer in a Capuchin the sick. death of his mother. Giovanni De Lellis monastery. There he finally realized that Camillus De Lellis, who lived from died, repentant for his sins, leaving his he was born for something more in life. 1550 to 1614, was born when his son the only worldly goods he had left, a After his conversion, he vowed to mother, Camilla, was sixty years old. His sword and a dagger. become a Franciscan. However, his father, Giovanni, was preoccupied with After his father’s death, Camillus hopes were soon dashed when the war and often away. Camilla had a vivid was wounded during the Venetian War. brothers dismissed him because of his dream before Camillus’s birth. She saw He sought a cure for his wound at the recurring leg ulcer. Later, after seeking her baby, his breast marked with a hospital of St. Giacomo, offering to treatment at a hospital, he entreated the cross, followed by a troop of children work for room and board.2 The superin- order to accept him again. The Capu-

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chin Order accepted him back, and he completing his studies, to be ordained nursing care to beggars, prisoners and took the name Brother Christopher. By he also had to provide evidence that he anyone in need. He declared, “A servant working in the Franciscan monastery, could support himself. Thanks to an of the sick without charity is like a body he was able to subdue his temptations. unexpected benefactor, Camillus was without a soul.”4 He displayed kindness His self-confidence increased, and he ordained and was able to start his order to any living creature, while main- endeared himself to others. He discov- with a small band of men. taining his keen sense of humor. While ered that the more he gave himself to After taking up the most arduous walking with a young novice whose helping others, the happier he became. tasks, the company soon became head ached violently from the heat, St. Philip Neri had warned him that known as Ministers of the Sick. They Camillus responded, “Come closer to he should not go back to the Francis- followed Camillus’s example of me. I am very tall, and my shadow will cans, and as expected, Camillus was serving the sick in hospitals, in homes, keep the sun off you.”5 dismissed when his wound reopened. in jails and on the streets. He encour- In addition to his ongoing obstinate Not giving up, he returned to Rome, aged his brothers to nurse the sick as a leg wound, he also had a hernia, two resolved to devote himself forever to mother might nurse her only child who large corns on the soles of his feet, renal the sick. After being refused twice by was ill. In a true sense, Camillus recog- colic and kidney stones. However, at the Capuchin Order of Franciscans, he nized the importance of whole-person sixty-two, he continued to persevere appealed to the Observantines, who care. and see Christ in the sick while minis- also denied him entrance because of his When Camillus was appointed tering to them during the terrible famine infected wound. superior of his order, he requested that of 1612. When doctors were discussing Camillus returned to San Giacomo members of the order wear cloaks and a a new treatment for his ailments, he and was appointed superintendent of a red cross on the right side of their responded, “Listen, I have had so many hospital that had no trained permanent cassocks to distinguish them from other medicines—in Naples, in Genoa, in staff of nurses. Patients were badly groups. He and his companions not Rome—and none of them have done me mistreated; some were even brought to only bore the cross upon their habits, any good. God does not want me to be the mortuary while still alive. Needless but, with the true Franciscan love of cured. I ought to suffer a little, at any to say, Camillus faced a huge challenge, poverty and humiliation, they bore it in rate, at the end of my life.”6 but he persevered and cared for those their hearts, setting out to assist those in When his end came at the age of that others would not approach. need.3 His mother’s dream was finally sixty-five, forty years after his conver- Religious orders, such as the Jesuits, fulfilled. sion, he stretched out his arms in the were accustomed to sending their Epidemics, plagues and poverty form of a cross, pronounced his thanks- young men to visit the hospitalized and were common in the late sixteenth giving for the blood of Christ, and died.7 began to choose San Giacomo because century. Not content with treating only The masses called out that the “father of of Camillus and his charitable acts on patients in a hospital, Camillus and his the poor is dead.”8 In 1886 Pope Leo behalf of the sick. He never omitted any nursing brothers sought out the sick XIII declared Camillus De Lellis to be act of charity that would alleviate the and dying in the poorest quarters of the patron of all the sick and those who pain of the sick poor. It is said that there Rome. They distributed food and nurse them. ■JCN was no home that he loved so well as a clothing, as well as nursing care. hospital. It was there that he found his Camillus felt that good nursing 1Edmund Curley, St. Camillus (Milwaukee: The Bruce consolation. depended on love; therefore, the more Publishing Co., 1962), 29. 2Ibid., 41. Since his mind was preoccupied it was independent of wages the better 3Alban Goodier, Saints for Sinners (London: Sheed and with the idea of serving the sick and the it would be. Ward, 1945), 131. 4C. C. Martindale, Life of Saint Camillus (New York: desire to enter religious life, he began Camillus originally wanted charity Sheed and Ward, 1946), 114. to picture what he was doing with the and humility to be the hallmarks of his 5Ibid., 138. sick as a future religious order. order. The brothers were to take the 6Ibid., 138. 7 However, he had to be ordained to lowest places and to work with cases Ibid., 137. 8Sanzio Cicatelli, St. Camillus of Lellis (Quezon City, accomplish this goal, which would that terrified paid servants. However, Philippines: Camillian Publications, 1980), 193. necessitate completing his education. not all agreed with him. They felt it was Although he was sharp witted and had absurd to withdraw their direct spiritual ■ Carol M. Harrison, RN, an excellent memory, he had had no and physical care of the sick to scrub EdD, is the chair of the formal schooling. floors and do things that others could nursing division at Spring Hill College in Mobile, At age thirty-two, he began his do better. He compromised, even Alabama. She teaches intro academic studies at the Roman College. though he felt that they should do it all. to nursing, senior seminar and practicum. Carol His worst subject was philosophy, in Camillus even loved to cook small deli- serves on the board of which he was placed in the lowest class cacies for hard-to-please convalescent directors at Mercy Medical with twelve- and thirteen-year-old patients. and on the parish nurse council. Carol is the author boys. He developed humility and The man who once was a trooper of many published articles.

Illustration: Courtesy Abbey Press patience as the boys mocked him. After and a gambler now gave constant

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