Bonfilius was born about the year 1040 at Osimo, near Ancona in the Marche. While still young he entered the Benedictine monastery of Santa Maria di Storaco near Filottrano. Though the youngest in the community, he was renowned for his knowledge of Sacred Scripture and was elected abbot of the house.
Between 1072 and 1078 he was chosen bishop of Foligno. In 1078 he made a donation to the canons of the church of Foligno, and in 1080 he encouraged Mainardo in the foundation of the Abbey of Sassovivo, showing a steady care for the life of the local Church.
In 1096 he fulfilled a long desire to go to the Holy Land and joined the pilgrimage connected with the First Crusade. His companions died one by one along the way, yet he reached Jerusalem alone. There he lived as a hermit in penance and solitude until about 1104, when he returned to Italy after roughly a decade in the East.
Finding that the see of Foligno had been filled by Bishop Andreas, he accepted the change with humility and went back to the abbey of Storaco. Later, facing difficulties among some of the monks, he withdrew to the hermitage of Santa Maria of la Far (Nostra Signora della Fara) near Cingoli. Worn by austerity and prayer, he died a natural death there on 27 September 1115.
Saint Sylvester Gozzolini, founder of the Sylvestrines, was inspired by Bonfilius's example and became his first biographer. The saint's remains were later placed in Cingoli Cathedral. His memory is kept on 27 September in Osimo and on 28 January in Cingoli; the Roman Martyrology commemorates him on 27 September.
May Saint Bonfilius obtain for us a humble heart that seeks God in solitude and Scripture as he did.
