Today, February 16, is the memorial of Blessed Joseph Allamano.
Founder of the Consolata Missionaries.
Joseph was born in 1851 in Asti, Northwestern Italy. He was the nephew of St. Joseph Cafasso, elder brother of his mother Marianna. His father, also named Joseph, died of anthrax when the child was three years old.
He studied at the Salesian Oratory in Valdocco, Italy. St. John Bosco was one of his spiritual directors. He entered the diocesan seminary of Turin, Italy in 1866 and was ordained in 1873.
He then served as spiritual director of the Turin seminary and as rector of the Consolata Shrine which he remodeled and turned into a source for spiritual renewal and retreat.
He founded the Consolata Missionary Priests and Brothers in 1901. Nine years later, he founded the Consolata Missionary Sisters for women with a missionary vocation.
He also worked for the beatification of his uncle, St. Joseph Cafasso, which successfully concluded in 1925.
Joseph died of natural causes in 1926. Pope St. John Paul II beatified him in 1990.