John was born about 1209[1] in the medieval commune of Parma in the northern Italian region of Emilia-Romagna; his family name was probably Buralli.
Educated by an uncle, chaplain of the Church of St. Lazarus at Parma, his progress in learning was such that he quickly became a teacher of philosophy (magister logicæ).
He assisted at the First Council of Lyons in 1245, representing the current Minister General, Crescentius of Jesi, who was too ill to attend.
[6] At Sens in France, King Louis IX (later a member of the Third Order of St. Francis) honored with his presence the Provincial Chapter held by John.
Having visited the Provinces of Burgundy and of Provence, he set out in September 1248, for Spain, whence Pope Innocent recalled him to entrust him with an embassy to the East.
[8] The object of John's embassy to the East was reunion with the Eastern Orthodox Church, whose representatives he met at Nice, and who saluted him as an "angel of peace".
The pope may have exerted some pressure on John, who was only too glad to resign, seeing himself unable to promote henceforth the good of the Order.
John retired to the hermitage at the famed village of Greccio, near Rieti, memorable for the Nativity scene first introduced there by Francis of Assisi.
[14] Angelus Clarenus claims that the concealed motive of this process was John's attachment to the literal observance of the Rule; the accusation of Joachimism, against which he professed his Catholic faith, being only a pretext.
[18] Hearing that the Orthodox were abandoning the union agreed upon in 1274, John, now 80 years old, desired to use his last energies in the cause of Christian unity.
The "Chronicle of the XXIV Generals"[20] ascribes to John the allegoric treatise on poverty: "Sacrum Commercium B. Francisci cum Domina Paupertate" (ed.