Saint Raphael Kalinowski: An Introduction to His Life and Spirituality

Biography and anthology of the Polish engineer and freedom fighter, exiled to Siberia, who became the restorer of Carmel in Poland and the first Carmelite friar canonized since John of the Cross. Translated by Thomas Coonan, Michael Griffin, OCD, and Lawrence Sullivan, OCD.


Little known outside his native Poland, Joseph Kalinowski (Raphael of St. Joseph, OCD) was born in 1835 and became, by turns, an engineer, a military officer, a leader in the 1863 insurrection against Russian domination, an exile in Siberia, a tutor, and eventually a Discalced Carmelite priest. He died in 1907 at the Carmelite monastery he had founded in Wadowice, the city where Karol Wojtyla-the future Pope John Paul II who would later beatify and canonize him-was born only 13 years later. Today Raphael Kalinowski is remembered especially as a man of boundless charity in the Siberian prison camps, a restorer of Carmel in Poland, a skilled confessor and spiritual director, and a tireless promoter of Marian devotion and of unity between the Eastern and Western Churches. In 1991, he became the first Discalced Carmelite friar canonized since St. John of the Cross. This booklet offers a concise introduction to one of the pope's favorite saints, and includes a brief biography of Saint Raphael Kalinowski, a synthesis of his spiritual message, 12 photos, and (for the first time in English) selections from his writings.