CELESTRI, ANTONIO. — Italian theologian, born in Palermo on 13 October 1649 and died there on 19 March 1706. At the age of 16 he became a religious of the Third Regular Order of S. Francesco (1664); he taught philosophy and theology in various convents of the Order, and was provincial of Rome and Sicily, then procurator general (1683–86).
He wrote the apologetic work Christiana cath. religio contra gentiles, mahumetanos, hebraeos et sectarios, 23 propositionibus demonstrata (Rome 1683), and a learned Tabula Conciliorum generalium omnium, 1 vol. in-fol. (there 1684; 2nd ed., under the title Conciliorum omnium schema).
BIBL.: A. Mongitore, Bibliotheca sicula, I, Palermo 1707, p. 39; E. d'Alençon, s. V. in DThC, II, col. 2068; R. Luconi, Comitia gen. III Ord. Regul. S. Franc. eorumque acta selecta, Rome 1944, p. 80. Lorenzo Di Fonzo