Saint Catherine of Siena

Italian nun and mystic

• Born: March 25, 1347
• Birthplace: Siena, Tuscany (now in Italy)
• Died: April 29, 1380
• Place of death: Rome (now in Italy)

This patron saint of Italy and doctor of the Church helped to persuade the Avignon Papacy to return to Rome. She is also known for her mystic writings, which advocate a combination of personal ecstatic experience with active service in the world.

Early Life

Caterina Benincasa was born in Siena (see-EHN-uh), Italy, the twenty-third child of Giacomo Benincasa, a cloth dyer, and his wife, Lapa Piacenti. Lapa was more than forty years old when Catherine and her twin sister, Giovanna, were born and did not believe that she could nurse both infants. She sent Giovanna to a wet nurse and nurtured Catherine herself. In her old age, Lapa remembered Catherine as a specially favored child, nursed by her mother for a full year and brought to robust health, while her less fortunate twin died. Catherine remained attached to her family throughout her life, and images of nurturing pervade her writings.

The young Catherine was also influenced by Sienese life in the mid-fourteenth century. When she was a year old, the Black Death (bubonic plague) swept through the city, beginning a series of epidemics that brought death and panic. The Benincasa family was not prosperous enough to leave the city; Catherine lost a number of siblings and spent her early years surrounded by the fear of death and of God's punishment.

Catherine also heard of momentous happenings in the larger Christian world. The Dominican monks who preached in Siena told of the popes who lived in Avignon, France, instead of in Rome. She also heard of the Christian hope for a crusade that would once and for all free the Holy Land from the Muslims who held it. These events and expectations influenced the causes that she championed later in her life.

Catherine was drawn early to the religious life. At the age of six or seven, she had her first vision of Christ smiling at her. Between the ages of seven and twelve, she continued to grow spiritually, secretly making a vow of chastity and attempting to recapture the sweet vision that had so moved her.

When Catherine reached adolescence, her family wanted to find for her a good husband. For a while, Catherine accepted this role, but when she was fifteen, her favorite older sister died in childbirth. From that time on, Catherine actively rejected the world and began the strict self-denial that marked her life. She slept little, bound an iron chain tightly about her hips, and whipped herself daily. She consumed only bread, water, and raw vegetables, and a few years later she gave up the bread and ate almost nothing at all. She wanted to conquer all fleshly desires and leave room only for the spiritual life.

By the time she was sixteen, all these activities had persuaded her family that she was serious about her calling, and she joined the Dominican order in the congregation of the Sisters of Penance. This order of nuns did not stay in a convent, so Catherine continued to live at home with her family. From 1364 to 1367, she lived in isolation, praying and having ecstatic religious experiences in which she felt that Christ was one with her in a form of spiritual marriage. These experiences would continue throughout her life. In 1370, Catherine received the command to go into the world to do God's work.

Life's Work

Catherine began her work of serving God in Siena. She cared for the poor, giving away all of her possessions and many of her family's goods. She also patiently cared for the sick. During this time of activity, she continued to abuse her body to overcome the flesh, and these austerities took their toll on her health. She was strikingly thin and often had to take to her bed, exhausted by her fasting and the ecstatic experiences that made her seem to be in a trance.

In these early years of activity, Catherine began to acquire a following. She became the spiritual mother of a group of disciples that surrounded her until her death. At this time, she also acquired critics, who did not believe that she did not eat or that her religious trances were real. She became well-known, and her influence began to extend from caretaking to political action.

The Christian world was experiencing exciting political developments in 1370. In that year, Pope Urban V abandoned the city of Rome, to which he had returned briefly, to take the Papacy back to southern France. In the following year, the new pope, Gregory XI, called a Crusade. Throughout 1372, Catherine was an eager supporter of that crusade. She urged people to give money and other support to the venture. The Crusade never materialized, but Catherine increased her reputation as advocate of the Church's causes.

In 1374, Catherine was summoned to Florence to testify before the Dominican order. Church officials wanted to see if this young woman who was acquiring such a reputation for sanctity was in fact a servant of God. After questioning her, the officials agreed that she was indeed holy, but to be sure that she would remain so, they assigned Raymond of Capua to be her companion and confessor. Raymond stayed with Catherine throughout her life and wrote her biography. The Dominican officials were as concerned about the correctness of Catherine's perpetual fast as some of her neighbors had been, and they ordered her to eat. To demonstrate her obedience to church authority, she obeyed the order to eat but suffered severely from the food in her stomach until she forced herself to vomit. By her obedience in trying to eat, Catherine earned permission to continue her fasting.

In 1374, Catherine's political activity began to increase. Although she had never learned to read and write, she dictated letters to Italy's political figures, urging them not to take part in Florence's war on the Papacy that had been declared in 1375. She traveled to Pisa to try to dissuade other Italian cities from joining the antipapal league. She even wrote to the famous mercenary soldier John Hawkwood to urge him to Christian behavior. She believed that many of these internal Italian wars were increased by the pope's continued absence in France, and she took up the cause of persuading him to return to Rome.

These political activities did not interfere with her spiritual growth. She continued her religious trances, and in 1375, she received the stigmata, the piercing of her hands and feet as Christ had been pierced. This mark of union with Christ was a high honor, but Catherine was so modest that she asked God to keep the marks invisible. (Most who received the stigmata bled from their hands and feet.) Needless to say, there was controversy for centuries about whether Catherine had received the marks because there was no visible evidence for it. (In 1630, Pope Urban VIII pronounced her stigmata authentic, and since then, it has been accepted by the Church as fact.)

In 1376, Catherine traveled to Avignon to talk to the pope. She urged him to reform the Church, and as a critical part of that reform, she wanted him to return to Rome. In September, 1376, Catherine's dream was fulfilled and Pope Gregory XI left Avignon to return to Rome, where he would be plagued by political problems until his death in March, 1378. Catherine's part in influencing the pope's return is remembered as her major political accomplishment, although historians have since downplayed her role in the papal move, emphasizing the unrest and violence in France at the time as a more prominent reason for the pope's decision.

Catherine returned to Italy, where between 1377 and 1378 she composed her great mystical work, which she simply called “Book,” but which has come to be known as Libro della divina dottrina (The Dialogue of the Seraphic Virgin, Catherine of Siena, 1896; better known as The Dialogue). In this work, she articulated more fully the mystical theology of love and service that was evident in her many letters. Catherine must have believed that her major life's work was accomplished; she had written her mystic vision and she had brought the pope back to his rightful home in Rome. However, political events were once more to draw her into the secular world.

After Gregory XI's death in 1378, the Papacy underwent a crisis even more serious than the pope's residence in France. Urban VI was elected to be Gregory's successor, but in September of 1378, thirteen disaffected cardinals returned to Avignon and elected Clement VII to be pope. The Church was now split into two factions. The Great Schism would last until 1415, when the Council of Constance (1414-1418) was able again to reunite the Catholic world under one head. Catherine rallied to the support of Urban VI, whom she considered to be the rightful pope. She dictated letters to cardinals and kings, rebuking them for their betrayal of the unity and reform she had advocated. She moved to Rome to support Urban VI with her advice and prayers. Political events, however, had gone beyond that which she could change. In January, 1380, she turned to the only thing that she could control her body. She increased her fast by refusing to drink even water. She would be a final sacrifice to save the Church. Her last months were plagued by pain and visions of demons, and on April 29, 1380, Catherine died with a final vision of the weight of the ship of the Church (that she had worked so hard to save) descending onto her shoulders.

Significance

In 1395, Catherine's confessor, Raymond of Capua, completed his Legenda major (The Life of Catherine of Siena, 1960). He wrote the long biography based on interviews with Catherine's mother and other followers. This biography was widely read and copied. In 1477, an Italian translation was made of Raymond's Latin text, and this became one of the first printed books. Catherine's life was a model for others who wanted to serve the Church through a life of self-sacrifice and mystic longing. Her influence also extended beyond the example of her life. In 1461, she was declared a saint by Pope Pius II, and she is considered, with Saint Francis of Assisi, as a patron saint of Italy.

Catherine's influence has been recognized into the twentieth century. In 1970, Pope Paul VI declared Catherine to be a doctor of the Church. She and Saint Teresa of Ávila are the only women who have been granted this status. By bestowing the title of doctor on Catherine, the pope declared that Catherine's writings are worthy to be studied by all Catholics.

There were several reasons that the pope found Catherine's writings worthwhile. The first was that her mysticism, her religious ecstasies, did not cause her to retire from the world. On the contrary, Catherine believed that her mystic connection with Christ required that she work actively to help her neighbors, her church, and her world.

A second important theme in her works was that there could be no Christian life outside the hierarchic structure of the Catholic Church. She believed that the blood of Christ flowed through the Church, so no one should be separate from that structure even if they had, like she, been joined mystically to Christ. This made her work actively to support the Church and the Papacy. This effort was particularly important during the late fourteenth century, when the hierarchic church was troubled by so many tensions and political problems. Hers was a voice that reminded the Church that its task was a spiritual one and reminded believers of their intimate relationship to that church.

Finally, Pope Paul VI declared her spirit of self-sacrifice to be worthy of awe. It is perhaps for this spirit that Catherine remains best known. The pious child who starved herself and abused her body to rebel against her parents’ desire that she marry and to rebel against her own desires for physical comfort later continued those sacrifices to join spiritually with Christ and to serve the Church. At the end, she starved herself in a final sacrifice, attempting to save the Church she had worked all of her short life to reform.

Bibliography

Catherine of Siena, Saint. Catherine of Siena: Passion for the Truth, Compassion for Humanity. Edited, annotated, and introduced by Mary O’Driscoll. New Rochelle, N.Y.: New City Press, 1993. A translation of selected writings of the saint, with introductory notes that provide valuable information on her life and theology. Bibliography.

Catherine of Siena, Saint. The Dialogue: Catherine of Siena. Translated by Suzanne Noffke. New York: Paulist Press, 1980. The introduction gives a short summary of the saint’s life and thought and describes the structure of The Dialogue. Indispensable for those who seek a full understanding of Catherine’s theology. Contains a complete bibliography and index.

Catherine of Siena, Saint. The Letters of Catherine of Siena. Translated by Suzanne Noffke. Tempe, Ariz.: Arizona Center for Medieval and Renaissance Studies, 2000. The first volume in the new English edition of Catherine of Siena’s letters. Bibliography and indexes.

Cavallini, Giuliana. Catherine of Siena. New York: G. Chapman, 1998. A biography of Catherine that deals with her life, her writings, and her theological beliefs as well as her political interactions with the Church. Bibliography and index.

Hilkert, Mary Catherine. Speaking with Authority: Catherine of Siena and the Voices of Women Today. New York: Paulist Press, 2001. Hilkert discusses Catherine of Siena and her role in the Church. Bibliography.

Noffke, Suzanne. Catherine of Siena: Vision Through a Distant Eye. Collegeville, Minn.: Liturgical Press, 1996. Written by a leading authority on Catherine of Siena, this series of essays is divided into two parts: The first examines aspects of Catherine’s vision in her theology and spirituality; the second offers resources for further exploration of Catherine’s person and thought, of her world, and of what others have written of her in English. There is a very helpful annotated bibliography.

Raymond of Capua. The Life of Catherine of Siena. Translated by Conleth Kearns. Wilmington, Del.: Michael Glazier, 1980. Provides a translation of the Legenda major, which was completed in 1395 by her friend and confessor and forms the basis for all subsequent biographies. The introduction gives a good background of the life of Raymond and serves to complement the life of Catherine presented in this accessible translation.