A lawyer and later a diplomat for Pope Julius II, Catejan was a late vocation who didn't become a priest until age 35. He joined a religious confraternity named the Oratory of Divine Love, which was dedicated to prayer and charity.
Catejan founded a hospital in Venice, Italy, for people with incurable diseases, and then surprised his friends and fellow priests be entering a controversial religious community of men from society's lowest ranks. He continued to serve the sick and the poor.
Later Catejan and three friends (one was the bishop of Chieti, Italy, who would become Pope Paul IV) founded a religious congregation called the Theatines (named after the Latin name of Chieti, Theate). To protect the poor against usurers, he began a non-profit "bank" that would lend them money. The institution became the Bank of Naples.
St. Catejan died in Naples, Italy, in 1557 at age 66.
The Theatines were the first religious community to found missions in Borneo, Sumatra, Arabia, Armenia and Persia.
During the 19th century, the order begain to decline, and in 1909 the Theatines united with the Spanish Congregation of the Holy Family, but this union was dissolved in 1916. The congregation of Theatine nuns has almost disappeared.
- Little White Book, Diocese of Saginaw