One of the youngest of 25 children, and one of first two women to be honored as a Doctor of the Roman Catholic Church, this month’s mystical poet, along with Saint Francis of Assisi, is recognized as a joint Patron Saint of Italy. In 1999, Pope John Paul II also made her a patron saint of Europe, as well.
Saint Catherine of Sienna, born March 27, 1347 in Sienna, Italy, only lived to be 33 years old. But her life cannot be measured simply by years. Her circle of influence was large during her lifetime and grew larger after her death.
Her writings are not extensive, yet they rank among the classics of the Italian language. Written in the beautiful fourteenth century Tuscan vernacular, her works are still treasured even today.
Catherine’s only major work is known as the “Dialogue,” or the “Treatise on Divine Providence.” Other than this there is only a series of “Prayers” and a large collection of letters. The letters, numbering almost 400, are without a doubt, the most complete expression of this saint’s multi-faceted personality.
This collection of letters is priceless to students and historians. The letters were written to popes, kings and other sovereigns. They were addressed to rulers of republics and army generals. And they were written to private citizens and common religious women and men, as well.
Many in the Church have expressed their belief that the letters of Catherine are truly as powerful today as when they were first written; that the spiritual advice offered by this devout lady is as illuminating now as it was in the fourteenth century.
Born Caterina Benincasa, her father, Giacoma, was a cloth dyer whose sons helped him in his business. Her mother, Lapa Piagenti, thought by some to be the daughter of a local poet, was about 40 when Catherine and her twin sister were born.
Her sister was given to wet nurse, but soon died. Catherine was nursed by her mother and survived.
Catherine was born into a time of both class struggle and religious wars. It was also the era of the Black Plague and time when there was famine in her hometown of Siena. She claimed to have her first vision of Christ when she was six or seven. And it was about this time she vowed chastity.
When she was about sixteen her older sister, Bonaventura, died in childbirth. Both her parents wanted her to marry her sister’s widower. Catherine absolutely refused and began a massive fast. Her parents relented and permitted her to live as she chose.
It was during these turbulent teenage years that Catherine first learned the true power of the interior life. As she later told Raymond of Capua, her confessor and biographer, during troubled times, she advised that one should “Build a cell inside your mind, from which you can never flee.”
She became a Dominican tertiary, but lived inside her parents home rather than a convent. In about 1366 she experienced what she later called a “Mystical Marriage” with Jesus. It was around this time that she felt Christ instructed her to leave her withdrawn life and enter into the more public life of the world. And that she did.
Much of Catherine’s life was dedicated to helping the ill and the poor. She took care of them in hospitals and homes. She was also known to give away food and clothes without asking anyone’s permission. This life of active service was balanced with a deep interior life of prayer and contemplation.
She devoted much of her time to relieving the mental and emotional suffering of those seeking her help. Speaking about the suffering of those with who she worked this gentle saint once commented,
Strange, that so much suffering is caused by the misunderstanding of God’s true nature. God’s heart is more gentle than the Virgin’s first kiss upon the Christ. And God’s forgiveness to all, to any thought or act, is more certain than our own being.
Her life of piety soon attracted followers, both men and women. And that brought her to the attention of the Dominican Order. In 1374 she was called to Florence to be interrogated for possible heresy, but after examination she was deemed sufficiently orthodox.
After her trip to Florence she began traveling throughout Northern and Central Italy where she advocated the reform of the clergy and the launching of a new crusade. It was also during this period that Catherine began writing letters to those she knew.
Soon she expanded her audience to Church leaders and other figures in authority. She begged for peace between the republics and principalities of Italy, even as she pleaded for the return of the Papacy from Avignon, France to Rome.
Catherine was known for advising all those who sought her help that repentance and renewal could only be done through the “the total love for God.” Her single major work, THE DIALOGUE OF DIVINE PROVIDENCE, is a dialogue between a soul who rises up to God and God. It was recorded between 1377 and 1378 only a couple of short years before her death.
Catherine of Siena’s Poems
CONSUMED IN GRACE
I first saw God when I was a child, six years of age.
the cheeks of the sun were pale before Him,
and the earth acted as a shy
girl, like me.
Divine light entered my heart from His love
that did never fully wane,
though indeed, dear, I can understand how a person's
faith can at time flicker,
for what is the mind to do
with something that becomes the mind's ruin:
a God that consumes us
in His grace.
I have seen what you want;
it is there,
a Beloved of infinite
tenderness.
THE SANCTUARY
It could be said that God’s foot is so vast
That this entire earth is but a
field on His
toe,
and all the forests in this world
came from the same root of just
a single hair
of His.
VULNERABLE
Vulnerable we are, like an infant.
We need each other’s care
Or we will
Suffer.
CONSECRATED
All has been consecrated.
The creatures in the forest know this,
The earth does, the seas do, the clouds know
as does the heart full of
love.
Strange a priest would rob us of this
knowledge
and then empower himself
with the ability
to make holy what
already was
THE FOUNDATION OF GOD
My perfect Lord sang,
“less likely is God to condemn my hand’s action
Than to condemn any
Soul.”
How could that be possible,
My heart thought?
And the Christ, knowing all minds, replied,
“Forgiveness is the foundation of God’s
Being.”