Jerome Gratian

• Name — Jerome Gratian • Honorific Suffix — OCD • Native Name — Jerónimo Gracián • Other Names — Jerónimo de la Madre de Dios • Birth Name — Jerónimo Gracián Dantisco • Born — 6 June 1545 • Birthplace — Valladolid, Kingdom of Castile, Crown of Castile • Died — 21 September 1614 • Place of death — Brussels, Spanish Netherlands

Son of Diego Gracián de Alderete, brother of Lucas Gracián Dantisco, and grandson of the Polish humanist and Erasmian Juan Dantisco (Jan Dantyszek), he studied at the Jesuit college in Madrid and then went to the University of Alcalá to study theology and philosophy. He was ordained a priest in 1569. He was a disciple of Saint Teresa of Jesus. As provincial of the reform, he supported a missionary Discalced Carmelite order for men, encouraging the apostolic work of the friars. However, in conflict with Father Nicholas Doria, who represented the observant movement desired by Philip II, shortly after the death of Saint John of the Cross, he was expelled from the Order. In 1593, he was captured by Barbary corsairs while sailing from Messina to Rome. He was held captive in Ottoman Tunisia for 2 years until ransomed. His captors firebranded him with a cross on the sole of one foot to punish his evangelizing. Gracián was rehabilitated by Pope Clement VIII in a brief which would have restored him to the Order, had the Discalced Carmelite superiors in Spain been willing to receive him. He was instead admitted by the Carmelites at San Martino ai Monti. He was officially rehabilitated by the Discalced Carmelite Order in 1991.