St. Catherine of Siena
St. Catherine of Siena was born during the outbreak of a plague in Siena, Italy on March 25, 1347. St. Catherine was the 23rd child to her parents Jacopo and Lapa Benincasa. St. Catherine is known for regarding her father as a representation of Jesus and her mother as Our Lady, and her siblings as the apostles, which helped her to serve them with humility.
Growing up half of her siblings were not able to survive their childhood and St. Catherine herself was actually going to be a twin, but her sister passed away at infancy. When St. Catherine was 16 years old, her sister Bonaventura, passed away. Due to her passing she left her husband behind and he became a widower. St. Catherine's parents proposed that St. Catherine should marry him. However St. Catherine was against this idea, so she decided to start fasting and she cut her hair very short so that she could change the way she looked.
St. Catherine’s parents continued to try to convince her to get married however they were unsuccessful so they gave up. St. Catherine’s father decided that she would be left alone and left in peace. Therefore St. Catherine was given a separate room where she could pray and meditate in peace on her own.
At the age of 18, St. Catherine decided to enter the Dominican third order and she spent the next three years of her life in complete seclusion, prayer and plainness. Which meant that she did not care about the materialistic things in her life, she lived a life of full devotion to God. Over time St. Catherine gained a group of people who started to follow her, these people included both men and women.
St. Catherine made it her responsibility to give things like food and clothes to the poor and vulnerable. St. Catherine never told anyone that she would give stuff away to the poor and she never talked bad about anyone that criticized her.
When she was around the age of 21, St. Catherine had an experience which she described as a “Mystical marriage to Christ.” St. Catherine had experienced many visions and experiences with God. However, during this specific experience that occurred when she was young, Jesus appeared to her and said that he wanted to marry her in faith. At the marriage, Mary appeared, and many other saints and angels appeared as well. At the mystical marriage Jesus put a ring on her finger and married her in faith. St. Catherine saw Jesus as her bridegroom. St. Catherine was completely consecrated to the lord.
After the experience, St. Catherine would visit hospitals so that she could help and aid the poor and the sick. During this time St. Catherine attracted many followers who helped her in her mission to serve the poor and sick.
When St. Catherine started to spend more time working, she started to travel more for her work. St. Catherine would spent a lot of her time trying to get the church to reform and she wanted to teach more people the importance of confession, so that more people could love God fully and completely. St. Catherine eventually started to get involved in politics and she made it her responsibility to make sure that cities stayed loyal to the Pope.
St. Catherine is known for visiting a political prisoner who had been condemned. St. Catherine did all that she could to help him know more about Christ and she was able to save his soul. St. Catherine was able to see his soul get taken up to Heaven the moment he passed away.
Later on in St. Catherine’s life, she was given the stigmata. St. Catherine also decided to take Bl. Raymond of Capua to be her confessor and spiritual director. Bl. Raymond of Capua wrote a book about the life of St. Catherine.
From the year 375 on, St. Catherine began to write letters to people. St. Catherine spoke out for peace and was a very important person in persuading the Pope in Avignon to make a return to Rome. St. Catherine was a very impactful in restoring the Papacy to Rome and in creating peace deals during a time when war was occurring between Italian city states.
St. Catherine during the year 1377, founded a monastery for women a bit outside of Siena, Italy. St. Catherine is said to have written over 400 letters and created many different prayers and other works. The works that St. Catherine created were so influential that St. Catherine was later declared a doctor of the church.
During the year 1380 at the age of 33 years old, St. Catherine had become ill, due to her habit of extreme fasting. BL. Raymond ordered her to eat, however she found it hard to, due to the fact that she was ill.
During the month of January, her illness had become more severe and impaired her ability to eat and drink. Within a couple weeks she could not use her legs anymore. St. Catherine died on April 29, 1380 due to a stroke that she had.
St. Catherine is the patron saint of nurses, people ridiculed for their faith and sick people. Her feast day is celebrated on April 29.
Prayer to St. Catherine of Siena
St. Catherine of Siena, intercede that we may be able to treat others with more love and kindness as you did. Help us through your intercession to strengthen our devotion to Christ so that we may be able to be united with you in Heaven one day. St. Catherine help us to be willing to help those in need without telling anyone about how we helped them. St. Catherine help us to be more humble, patient, merciful and courageous so that we may allow Christ to enter our lives completely and we may fulfill his will regardless of the many temptations or trials we may encounter.
We ask this through Christ Our Lord and Mary Our Mother in Heaven
Amen
St. Catherine of Siena pray for us
St. Joseph pray four us
May we continue to strengthen our journey to sainthood and keep others in our prayers.
Works cited:
Information (read from, not taken):
Catholic Online. “St. Catherine of Siena.” St. Catherine of Siena - Saints & Angels - Catholic Online. Accessed 25 March 2021.
Images:
Saint. Catherine of Siena. March 25, 2021.
Mystical marriage of Saint. Catherine of Siena. March 25, 2021.