Thursday April 29
Third from left: The Mystical Marriage of Catherine, Giovanni da Paolo, 1470; third from right, the head of St. Catherine in Siena's Basilica di San Domenico.
ST. CATERINA DA SIENA (Italy, 1347-1380), Virgin, Dominican lay sister, Mystic, Doctor of the Church
Caterina Benincasa was born the 23rd child of a Tuscan wool merchant, with a twin sister who died in infancy. At age 6, she told about seeing Jesus in a vision, the first of her lifelong mystical experiences, and at age 7, she vowed herself to chastity. Despite pressure from her family to marry, she joined the Dominican Third Order and lived the next three years of her life in seclusion but through her letters encouraging others in their spiritual life, she gathered an active apostolate around her. Her self-mortification to the extreme was well-known, and towards the end of her life, lived only on Communion. Early on, she started to wear a steel chain around her waist, with which she would beat herself three times a day, once for Christ, once for the living, and once for the dead. In 1366, she told her confessor she had entered into a 'mystical marriage' with Christ, who urged her to leave her private life and work in public. With her sister Dominicans, she travelled through the region advocating clergy reform and spiritual renewal, where she also gained renown for performing miracles of healing. She became interested in public affairs and started to exchange letters with public figures, including, famously, two Popes. (Her expression 'dolce Cristo in terra' for the Pope has become immortal, and was particularly dear to San Jose Maria Escriva, the founder of Opus Dei). When the Great Western Schism began in 1378 that led to two and sometimes even three rival Popes at a time, she travelled to Avignon and convinced Gregory VI to return to Rome. When he died, she supported the cause of his successor Urban VI and went to Rome at his invitation to serve at the Vatican. She died at the age of 33, ostensibly from failure to eat. More than 300 of her letters survive, along with her main work, The Dialogues of Divine Providence in which she recreates her own conversations with God. In 1375, she is believed to have received the stigmata in Pisa, but these only became visible on her death. Her remains are venerated in the Church of Santa Minerva in Rome, but about ten years after she died, her native city of Siena was able to take possession of her incorrupt head, and when it came home to Siena, her own mother was still alive to take part in the procession that installed the relic in the Basilica of San Domenico. The Benincasa house in Siena was kept intact and is now a shrine to the saint. In 1939, Pius XII declared her and St. Francis of Assisi as co-patrons of Italy; in 1970, Paul VI proclaimed her and St. Teresa of Avila as the first woman Doctors of the Church, and in 1999, John Paul II made her one of the Patrons of Europe.
Readings from today's Mass: www.usccb.org/nab/readings/042910.shtml
OR today.
At the General Audience, the Pope cites the examples of the priest-saints Leonardo Murialdo and Giuseppe Cottolengo of Turin:
'In Christ and in the Church, the priest lives charity'
Other stories about the Pope in this issue are a tribute from the president of the Italian Senate (translated in the post above); and the Preface by famed conductor Riccardo Muti to a new book that puts together Joseph Ratzinger/Benedict XVI's reflections on music and art. Page 1 international news: Stock markets fall worldwide because of the Greek debt crisis; some glimmers of hope towards a new start to Israeli-Palestinian peace talks; and the UN's urgent appeal for international aid to victims of famine in Niger.
THE POPE'S DAY
The Holy Father met today with
- H.E. Jean-Pierre Hamuli Mupenda, Ambassador from the Democratic Republic of the Congo, who presented
his credentials. Address in French.
- Bishops of the Episcopal Conference of Gambia-Liberia-Sierra Leone, on ad limina visit, as a group.
He received them individually earlier this week. Address in English.
- Mons. Robert Zollitsch, Archbishop of Freiburg in Bresgau, and president of the German Bishops' Conference, with
Mons. Reinhard Marx, Archbishop of Munich-Freising, and
Mons. Anton Losinger, Auxiliary Bishop of Augsburg,
This afternoon, he will meet with
- The Hon. Giorgio Napolitano, President of the Republic of Italy, who will offer him a concert at Aula Paolo VI
to mark the fifth anniversary of the Pontificate.
[Modificato da TERESA BENEDETTA 29/04/2010 15:09]