The Good Master

ul. św. Anny 11

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“For generations, university life has gathered around the relics of St John Cantius, where knowledge and wisdom seek an alliance with sanctity.” Karol Wojtyła, future saint John Paul II, said in 1982.
The most important place in the Collegiate Church of St Anne, situated in the vicinity of the Jagiellonian University, is the grave of St John Cantius (i.e. from Kęty), Professor of the Academy of Kraków, exquisite theologian, patron of academics and acts of mercy. He was known throughout the city as the Good Master (Magister Bonus), and his life has become enshrouded in multiple legends. Born in 1390, he studied philosophy and later theology at the Academy of Kraków. In 1419, he was anointed priest. For many years, John lectured in Kraków, proving exceptional meticulousness (he spent a great deal of time copying theological treatises, which he embellished with comments), as well as heartfelt care for students. According to a mediaeval legend, after the death of the Good Master, people used to see his hand with a candle in the streets of Kraków, guiding students who have lost the path to wisdom. St John was famous for his mercy: he fed the poor and gave them his own clothing. One winter he presented his shoes to a freezing poor man, and covered another one in his cloak, only to have it returned by the Blessed Virgin herself! Another day, he took mercy on a servant afraid of the anger of her mistresses, and miraculously mended a vessel she broke, and turned water drawn from the Rudawa River into milk. When a beggar knocked at the doors of the professors’ dining room in the Collegium Maius, the learned scholar announced that “Christ has acome” and invited him to the table. He was even known for giving away the last coins hidden in his clothing to thugs.
Devotion to John Cantius began following his death in 1473. People would go on pilgrimages to his grave in the Church of St Anne, famous for graces. One of the pious pilgrims was King John III Sobieski, who came here on the eve of his expedition to relieve the siege of Vienna in 1683. Having vanquished the army of the Ottoman Empire, he presented the Turkish bunchuks (standards) preserved to this day.
The Kraków professor was canonised by Pope Clement XIII in 1767. The baroque altar holding the mortal remains of the patron of academics is a work of Baldassare Fontana. The coffin is carried by four male figures carved in stone, symbols of the four faculties of the Academy of Kraków: theology, philosophy, law, and medicine. The monumental spirally twisted columns of the altar are crowned with the figures of the saints John: the Baptist, the Evangelist, Chrysostom, and Damascene. The murals decorating the walls and the ceiling portray scenes from the life of the Kraków saint.

ul. św. Anny 11
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