LEANDRO di SIVIGLIA, saint. – Born in Cartagena, of a Roman family, before 549; died at Seville on 13 March 600 or 601. First a Benedictine monk and later metropolitan of Seville, his name is connected with the principal events of that crucial period. He had great influence on the conversion of s. Ermenegildo and was consequently exiled by his father, Leovigildo (569–86). Around 580–82 L. was in Constantinople on a diplomatic mission on behalf of the Visigothic Church, and there he became friends with the future s. Gregorio Magno, whom he induced to write the Moralia.
L.’s great achievement was the evangelization of the Visigoths and the conversion of Recareto, followed by that of his people and solemnly ratified at the Third Council of Toledo (580): this “was the work of faith and industry” of L., as his brother s. Isidoro states. The solemn sermon delivered by L. on that occasion is one of the rare examples of the oratorical genre among the Visigoths.
Two anti-Arian polemical writings and L.’s correspondence, mentioned by s. Isidoro, have been lost. What remains, instead, is the short treatise De institutione virginum et de contemptu mundi, dedicated to his sister Fiorentina, followed by 31 chapters of an ascetical and disciplinary character. The work is a jewel of ascetical literature, in which, amid abundant reminiscences of the letters of s. Girolamo, the Rule of s. Agostino, Cassiano, and others, one can discern a personal style that is less elevated and imbued with affectionate simplicity.
He is entered in the Roman Martyrology on 27 February; in Spain he is venerated as a doctor.