BARTHOLOMEW OF CITTÀ DI CASTELLO, BLESSED, CORDONI, — Observant Franciscan of the Urban Province, born in 1471 from a noble family, died near Tunis in 1535, probably on August 10 (or 9). He was a pupil in Florence of Poliziano; after marrying and having two daughters, he became a Franciscan at the convent of Santa Maria degli Angeli in May 1504 following the death of his wife. He assisted plague victims in Terni (1526) and Gubbio (1527). As a missionary in Morocco (1534), he was beaten for the faith; the following year, he inspired the crusaders of Charles V in the assault on the fortress of La Goulette (Tunisia), defended by the Barbary corsairs. He was venerated as blessed for the eminence of his virtues.
His theological disciple Ilarione Pighi of Borgo San Sepolcro, with the approval of Cardinal Grimani, posthumously published (Perugia 1538) the mystical treatise *De unione animae cum supereminenti lumine*, written in dialogue form, partly in Latin and partly in Italian. The Capuchin Girolamo of Molfetta, who prepared a second edition: *Dialogo della unione spirituale de Dio con l'anima*, where the interlocutors are divine love, the soul as bride, and human reason (Milan 1539), with the approval of the Inquisitor of Milan. Subsequently, a spurious broadsheet circulated, in which a new method of prayer, derived from the epilogue and illustrated with geometric figures, was taught, likely by another author. The Holy Office condemned (March 8, 1654) both the book and the epilogue. Nevertheless, they were reprinted in Venice in 1593 and 1598 (?) under a false attribution to Fra Bartolomeo da Castello, a Capuchin; a further condemnation by the Holy Office followed (January 29, 1600, published August 7, 1603), and as late as February 1647 mention is made of a small booklet: *Dialogo abbreviato dell'unione spirituale di Dio con l'anima*. Because of these censures, the *Dialogo* remains on the Index.
Cordoni offers a profound and fervent analysis of divine love, which leads the soul to union and transformation in God; of the means or paths to attain it: humility, faith, the Eucharist, self-denial, infused grace, the gift of love; and of the operations of the soul fixed in love. He draws from the Church Fathers and the Scholastics, but above all from Jacopone da Todi and Uberto da Casale. He professes his complete adherence to the judgment of the Church; the first editor notes the opposition of some confreres to the pious master’s teachings, such as the exaltation of faith over works, the continuous Mass that the loving soul celebrates in Christ, and the aspiration for a union between God and the soul whereby it generates and offers Christ to the Father—doctrines that, in the atmosphere of Protestant doctrinal upheaval, could be misinterpreted. Moreover, the real abuses induced by the Epilogue provoked the condemnation. The analyst Giuseppe da Cannobio and the bibliographer Bernardo da Bologna, who attribute the work to Girolamo da Molfetta—probably confusing him with the famous preacher and polemicist Giacomo da Molfetta—were unaware of this condemnation.