GIOVANNI de DUKLA, blessed. — Franciscan, born at Dukla (Poland) in 1414, died at Leopoli in 1484.
While still young he entered the Order of Friars Minor Conventual, becoming a priest and serving several times as superior. When in 1453 St. Giovanni da Capestrano went to Poland, he transferred to the Observance. He devoted himself zealously to the apostolic ministry, especially to bringing the Russian and Armenian schismatics back to the Church. The kings and princes of Poland petitioned Paul V and Urban VIII for his canonization. Clement XII approved his cult and confirmed the decree of the Sacred Congregation of Rites by which it appointed G. among the principal patrons of Poland and Lithuania.
BIBL.: L. de Clary, Aureola Serafica, III, Quaracchi 1890, p. 95 ff.; Wadding, Annales, XIII, there 1932, p. 435; XIV, there 1933, pp. 431–36. Alberto Ghinato