St. Cajetan (1480-1547), who was born Gaetano da Thiene, was one of the earliest Italian Catholic reformers of the 16th century. He was a cofounder of the Clerks Regular, a religious order popularly known as the Theatines.

Cajetan was born into an aristocratic family of Vicenza in October 1480. He studied at Padua and in 1504 received his doctorate in canon and civil law. In 1505 he went to Rome, where Pope Julius II invited him to join the papal service as a secretary. On Sept. 30, 1516, he was ordained a priest. Cajetan was a kind, energetic, and practical man whose life was marked by strict poverty and intense activity. With other men, including the humanist Pietro Bembo, he organized the Roman Divino Amore, or the Oratory of Divine Love--not to be confused with St. Philip Neri's Congregation of the Oratory. Cajetan's Oratory provided a program for common prayer and discussion of...