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He is best known for the sheer volume of his writings (letters, sermons, dialogues, Homilien Moralia in Job, plainsongs) and as one of the four Latin
Fathers of the Church (along with Ambrosius, Augustinus, Hieroymus).
The son of a senator's family in Rome, he was born in 504 AD. From 572-573 AD he held the office of a judge, but he
was gripped by the suffering in the world around him and, after the death of his father, he established on his property in Sicily six monasteries and in his own house the monastery of St. Andrew,
which he himself joined as a monk. Many stories abound of miracles he performed through his prayers and his workings, also during his time as abbot in 585 AD. When Pope Pelagius II died of the
plague, Gregory was chosen to succeed him. But Gregory, who was reluctant to become pope, smuggled himself out of the city in a barrel and stole himself away to a cave to live the life of a
hermit. But a pillar of light with angels ascending and descending finally gave him away, and in 590 he was consecrated Pope. He died in 604 AD.
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