St Catherine of Siena

1347 - 1380 AD

Catherina Benincasa was born in 1347 AD. When she was 16 years old she became a Dominican tertiary. She was involved in an active apostolate, but was also a mystic who received the stigmata in 1371. In 1376 she traveled to Avignon and persuaded Pope Gregory XI to return to Rome. After writing her Dialogues, she died in 1380.

St. Catherine felt a vocation to the priesthood, as is clear from these two passages from Raymund of Capua’s biography of her: The Life of St Catherine of Siena, ed. Harvill Press, London 1960. Raymund had been Catherine’s spiritual director.

Part One. Chapter 5, pp. 34-35

Having made her vow of virginity, the holy maid grew holier every day. The little disciple of Christ began to fight against the flesh before the flesh had begun to rebel. She determined to give up eating meat, as far as she could, at least, and when she was obliged to sit down at table she usually either passed any meat on to her brother Stefano or threw it to the cats on the sly. As regards the discipline she practised upon herself, either alone or with the other children of her own age, she now endeavoured to increase its severity; and, believe it or not, she began to glow with a zeal for souls and with a specially strong love for saints who had laboured for the salvation of their fellow-men.

About this time it was revealed to her by the Lord that holy Father Dominic had formed the Order of Preaching Friars out of a zeal for the Faith and the salvation of souls, and she suddenly developed such a high idea of this Order that whenever she saw any of the Preaching Friars going past the house she would watch where they put their feet and then as soon as they had gone by go and kiss their footprints in a spirit of great humility and devotion. Hence arose within her an unquenchable longing to become a member of the Order and to join in the work of helping souls.

Then, remembering that she was a woman, she many times (as she confessed to me) thought of imitating St. Euphrosyne, whose name she had been given, who had gone into a monastery dressed in men’s clothing, so that she could go into distant parts where no one knew her, pretending to be a man, and so enter the Order of Preaching Friars and help towards the salvation of souls. But Almighty God had infused this zeal into her soul for other ends and intended to satisfy her desire in quite a different way, and He did not will that this scheme, which she had in mind for a long time, should ever be put into practice.

Meanwhile the holy maiden was growing up in body and especially in spirit. Her humility was strong, her devotion was increasing, her faith was growing more enlightened, hope was strengthening, charity becoming increasingly ardent, and with all these virtues her wisdom was plain to all eyes. Her parents were full of amazement, and her brothers full of admiration; at home they would all look at each other in wonder at finding so much wisdom in so young a child.

In confirmation of this I will repeat something solemnly told me by her mother.

Round about this time, when Catherine was between seven and ten, Lapa wanted to have a Mass said in honour of St. Anthony; so she called her daughter and said, “Go to the parish church and ask the priest to say a Mass in honour of St. Anthony, or get some other priest to say one, and leave the offering of so many candles and this money on the altar.” When she heard this, the young girl, always delighted to do anything to honour God, went running off to the church as fast as she could go, found the priest, did what her mother had told her to do, and was so delighted with any celebration of Mass that she stayed in the church until it was all over.

Meanwhile Lapa, who had wanted her to return home as soon as she had left the offering, had begun to worry, and she no sooner set eyes on the girl than she started scolding her, saying, as was thecustom in those parts, “Cursed be the chatterers who said you would never come back!” (This is a way some people have of describing people who are a long time turning up.) When she heard her mother say this the wise little maiden was silent for a while, then, taking her aside, she said, humbly, “Lady mother, when I don’t do what you tell me to do, or go too far, beat me as much as you like so that next time I shall take more care, because this is meet and just; but I beg you not to let my failings make your tongue run away with you and make you start cursing the neighbours, whoever they may be, because this doesn’t suit anyone of your age and it causes me very great pain.”

Her mother was rather taken aback by this sage reproof from her little daughter and for a while she hardly knew how to answer, seeing such great wisdom in such a tiny person, but, determined not to show her real feelings, she simply said, “Why have you been so long?” “Because I stayed to hear the Mass you had told me you wanted said,” Catherine replied; “as soon as it was over I came straight home.”

Her mother was even more highly edified by this, and when Giacomo came in she told him all about it in great detail, saying, “That daughter of yours said this to me, and this.” And her father, giving thanks to God in his heart, pondered on what had happened.

From this little incident, unimportant as it is amongst so many others, you can see, reader, how the grace of God went on increasing in the holy virgin during her marriageable years, of which the next chapter is to speak.

And here I stop. The facts I have described in this chapter I learned for the most part from Catherine herself; the rest I got from her mother and others who were at home with her at the time.

Part Two, Chapter 1, pp. 108-109.

[The Lord exhorted Catherine to live a less eremetical life:]

“Do you not remember that the zeal for souls which I planted and watered in your soul in the days of your infancy grew to such an extent that you planned to disguise yourself as a man and enter the Order of Preachers and go off into foreign parts, and so be more useful to yourself and other souls? The habit that you sought with such constancy, because of the great love you bore my faithful servant Dominic, who founded his Order mainly out of love of souls, you now possess. What is there to be astonished at or to lament about if I lead you to do what in infancy you desired to do?”

And Catherine, somewhat comforted by this reply, would say, as once Blessed Mary had said, “How shall this thing be?”

And the Lord said: “According as my goodness shall ordain.”

And Catherine, like a good disciple imitating her Master, would answer: “Let your will, not mine, be done in all things, Lord, for I am darkness and you are light; I am not, whereas you are He who is; I most ignorant, and you the wisdom of God the Father. But I beg you, O Lord—if it is not too presumptuous of me—how can what you have just said come about; that is to say, how can I, wretched and frail as I am, be of use to souls? My sex, as you know, is against it in many ways, both because it is not highly considered by men, and also because it is not good, for decency’s sake, for woman to mix with men.”

To these words the Lord would reply, as once the Archangel Gabriel had replied, that nothing is impossible to God, for He said:

“Am not I He who created the human race, and divided it into male and female? I spread abroad the grace of my spirit where I will. In my eyes there is neither male nor female, rich nor poor, but all are equal, for I can do all things with equal ease. It is as easy for me to create an Angel as an ant, and to create all the heavens is as easy for me as to create the merest worm. It is written of me that I made whatever I willed to make, for nothing is impossible to me.” (Psalm 113)

“Do you still remain doubtful? Do you imagine that I am unable to find ways of achieving whatever I have determined and predetermined on? However, I realize that you do not speak thus from lack of faith but from humility. Therefore you must know that in these latter days there has been such an upsurge of pride, especially in the case of men who imagine themselves to be learned or wise, that my justice cannot endure them any longer, without delivering a just chastisement upon them that will bring them to confusion. But since my mercy transcends all else I do, I shall first give them a salutary lesson, to see whether they will come to their senses and humble themselves; as I did with the Jews and the Gentiles, when I sent amongst them idiots whom I had filled with divine wisdom. To confound their arrogance, I will raise up women ignorant and frail by nature but endowed with strength and divine wisdom. Then, if the men will come to their senses and humble themselves, I will behave with the utmost mercy towards them, that is to say, towards those who, according to the grace given them, receive my doctrine, offered to them in fragile but specially chosen vessels, and follow it reverently. Those who will not accept this salutary lesson, I shall with perfect justice reduce to such confusion that the world will look upon them as objects of contempt and derision. For it is indeed only just that those who try to exalt themselves should be humbled. Therefore, be bravely obedient when in the future I send you out amongst people. Wherever you may find yourself, I shall not forsake you, or fail to visit you, as is my custom, and direct you in all that you are to do.”