June 22 is the feast of St. Paulinus of Nola (c. 353-431), the bishop of Nola and the poet of the late Latin West. Born at Bordeaux to a senatorial family, he was educated at the school of the rhetorician Ausonius, served as governor of Campania, and was baptized at Rome around 390. After the death of his son, he and his wife Therasia gave away their vast wealth, retired to Nola, near Naples, and lived as ascetics at the shrine of St. Felix.
Paulinus was ordained priest in 395 and bishop of Nola in 409. His poems — the Natalicia, annual poems in honour of St. Felix — are the first Christian poetry written for a specific saint's day, and his letters to Augustine, Jerome, and Sulpicius Severus are among the great literary correspondences of the patristic age. He died at Nola in 431 and was buried beside St. Felix.
Paulinus is the patron of Nola, near Naples, and of the city of Sutri, of which he was also bishop. From Bordeaux, where he was born, to Nola, where he was bishop, the June 22 feast is the feast of the senator who became the bishop and the poet.
