de spirituali amicitiâ

Historian, hagiographer and diarist with some rather explosive confessions for his time and station (supported by contemporary biographers), the feast day of Aelred of Rievaulx is observed on this day, marking his death in 1167 (*1110) at his abbey in Yorkshire.
The monk and abbot rather a folk saint have not been formally vetted by the canonisation process—though venerated in both the Catholic and Anglican faiths—is the patron for kidney stone sufferers (confined to bed in his later years from this affliction and arthritis) and has been adopted by several LGBTQIA+ organisations as the champion for his frank admission of conscious homosexual orientation and how its consenting exercise was a profound expression of Christian theology, laid out in his expansive treatise “On Spiritual Friendship.” While never censored per se, until the twentieth century, Aelred’s reputation as a historian—writing the vita of Saint Edward, King and Confessor among others—was emphasised over his theological work.