BERNARDO da CASTELVETERE. - Capuchin preacher and ascetical writer, born at Caulonia (formerly Castelvetere, province of Reggio Calabria) in 1708, died in 1756. He served as provincial definer, theology lecturer, popular preacher, and sought-after spiritual director.
His *Direttorio mistico per li confessori* (Venice [S. Occhi] 1750) went through 22 editions, two of them in Spanish. St. Alphonsus Liguori highly esteemed the *Direttorio* and made extensive use of it in his own works. B., like few other authors of his time, did not polemicize against Quietist errors, perhaps because he judged them to have no resonance among his readership.
BIBL.: G. F. A. Baccari, *Pratica del confessionale*, II, Florence 1838, p. 51; S. Alfonso de' Liguori, *Praxis confessarii*, ed. L. Gaudé, Rome 1912, n. 143; Francesco da Vicenza, *Appendice agli scritori cappuccini calabresi*, Umbertide 1916, pp. 9-10; Ludovic de Besse, *La science de la prière*, 2nd ed., Paris 1924, p. 16; Emidio d'Ascoli, s. V. in *DSP*, I, cols. 1505 ff. Felice da Mareto