Stained glass window from St. Dominic’s Church in Washington, D.C. Photo by Fr. Lawrence Lew, O.P.

At sixteen, Antoninus (1389 – 1459) joined the Dominican Order and for the next forty years served as local or provincial superior in various Italian priories. He founded the convent of San Marco under the patronage of Cosimo de Medici and also under the sodality of St. Martin. In 1446 Antoninus was appointed archbishop of Florence and undertook the reform of his diocese, whose clergy, he discovered, were profoundly uneducated. He produced a widely used manual for confessors and his Summa Historale, describing the scholastic method used to educate Dominicans since the time of Thomas Aquinas. His writings include a highly regarded Summa of moral theology, treatises on the Christian life, and a world history. Antoninus taught that the state had a duty to govern for the common good. He is portrayed in his bishop’s vestments giving to the poor.

The above excerpt is from Reflections of Dominican Spirituality: The Windows of St. Dominic Church, Washington, D.C. by Dr. Mary Moran.