 Chair
of Saint Peter, Apostle
Antiochíæ
Cáthedra sancti Petri Apóstoli, ubi primum
discípuli cognomináti sunt Christiáni.
The Chair of St. Peter at Antioch, where the
disciples were first called Christians.
ST PETER’S CHAIR
WE are accustomed to
use such phrases as the power of the “throne”, the heir to the
“throne”, the
prerogative of the “crown:, etc., substituting the concrete insignia of
dignity
for the office itself. The same metonomy is familiar in ecclesiastical
matters.
The “Holy See” is no more than the Sancta
Sedes, the holy chair, for the
word “see” is simply sedes, which has
come to us through the Old French sied. But
the Romans had another name, which they borrowed from the Greeks, for
the seat
occupied by a teacher or anyone who spoke with authority. This was cathedra, and its use in this sense can
not only be traced back to the early Christian centuries, but it
survives to
this day, notably in the phrase “an ex
cathedra decision”, that is to say a pronouncement in which the
pope speaks
as teacher of the Universal Church.
The question has
been raised whether the commemoration of “St Peter’s Chair” has arisen
out of
the honour paid to some material object venerated as a memorial and a
relic, or
whether the purpose of the feast was not from the first to glorify the
pontifical office conferred on St Peter and his successors at their
consecration.
Reference has previously been made, under January 28, to the ancient sedia gestatoria, known as St Peter’s chair,
now enshrined in the apse of Rome’s great basilica. De Rossi contended
that
this was honoured in the feast kept on February 22, but he has also
given
prominence to a mention by St Gregory the Great of “oil from the chair
upon
which Saint Peter first sat in Rome”, which seems to mean oil from the
lamps
which burned before a stone seat cut out of the tufa in the so-called
“coemiterium Ostrianum” where St Peter used to baptize. This seat the
great
archaeologist associated with the feast of January 18. It may be that
the two
feasts originated in some such tradition, but the arguments
vigorously urged
by Mgr Duchesne, Marucchi, and others against the identification of the
liturgical “chair of St Peter” with any material object seem to have
won the
day. Of the chair, ancient though it may be, now honoured at the
Vatican, there
is no mention, says Duchesne, before 1217. “Peter Mallius, writing of
the
basilica of St Peter (1159—1181) does not allude to it, and considering
how
constantly he enlarges on the relics therein, his silence shows that no
chair
of St Peter was venerated then.” And when we look at the earliest
collects,
lessons, etc., provided for the liturgical celebration, these seem to
indicate
that the dominating note of the feast was the glorification of St
Peter’s office.
It has already been
stated in connection with the feast of St Peter’s Chair on January 18
that
there was originally only one chair feast and that this was kept on
February
22, having no reference to Antioch, but presumably to the beginning of
St
Peter’s episcopate in Rome. What we know for certain is that the
Philocalian
calendar, which gives a list of the Roman liturgical celebrations in
A.D. 354, or possibly as early
as 336, contains on February 22 the entry natale Petri de
cathedra, i.e. “Peter’s
chair feast”, for natale by this
time, from its primitive meaning of birthday, had come to denote any
kind of
anniversary. We may thus be quite sure that in .the middle of the
fourth
century, within a very few years of the death of the Emperor
Constantine, the
Roman church honoured St Peter by a festival which was in some way
associated
with his consecration to the pastoral office. That this commemoration
had
anything consciously to do with Antioch is highly unlikely. Not until
several centuries
later do we find in the calendar of St Willibrord (c. A.D.
704) the entry Cathedra
Petri in Antiochia, and this is probably the earliest mention of
the sort
preserved to us. On the other hand it appears that in the Auxerrois
“Hieronymianum” of the sixth century the entry Cathedra
Petri in Roma must already have been attached to January 18;
but the Gallican liturgies for the most part adhere to February 22,
without any
mention of Antioch.
The most important
element in the case is undoubtedly the fact that on or about February
22
according to pagan usage occurred the annual commemoration of dead
relatives,
called the Feralia or Parentalia (when
food was brought to the
graves). It does not seem possible to determine a precise day, for
though Ovid
in his Fasti speaks of the Feralia
under the heading February 18, still by using the phrase parentales
dies he clearly implies that the celebration continued
for more than twenty-four hours, and there are other ancient
authorities who in
the same connection give prominence to February 21. As Kellner
points out,
during the Parentalia “no marriages were celebrated, the temples
remained
closed, and the magistrates laid aside the external insignia of their
office.
Upon the commemoration of the departed followed immediately, on
February 22,
the festival of surviving relatives, named in consequence Charistia
or Cara cognatio. This
celebration had no recognized place among the functions of the official
worship
of the state nevertheless it was
a very popular feast and struck its roots deeper into the life of the
people
than any of the official festivals”. This affords good reason for
supposing
that the very early institution of the feast of St Peter’s Chair was
simply an
effort to provide a Christian substitute for the pagan rites practised
at this
season (cf. January 1 in reference to
the New Year celebration, and Candlemas as regards the Robigalia and
Lupercalia). Several clear testimonies point to the same
conclusion. For
example, in the calendar of Polemius Silvius, compiled in Gaul about
the year
448, we have under February 22 the entry “the Deposition of SS. Peter
and Paul;
the dear ties of blood’ (cara cognatio) so
styled, because though there might be feuds among living relatives,
they would
be laid aside at the season of death”. This plainly suggests that a
Peter and
Paul feast had been introduced on this day as a substitute for the
pagan
celebration of the Charistia. Probably
the Christian festival was of much the same character liturgically
whether it
was called
“St Peter’s Chair at
Rome” or “the Deposition of SS. Peter and Paul”; it would in either
case have
amounted to a celebration of the special prerogatives of the Holy See.
What is perhaps most
surprising as an illustration of the vitality of superstitious abuses
is the
fact that as late as the middle of the twelfth century, the February
feast was
still called “St Peter’s banquet day”. * [*Yet is it so surprising when
we
reflect what can be seen even now no farther away than the Abbots
Bromley
horn-dance and the so-called hobby-horse at Padstow on May 1]
Beleth
the liturgist, to whom we owe this information,
is said to have been an Englishman, but he lived a good deal in France
and it
is perhaps the latter country to which he is referring. After
mentioning that
both the feasts of St Peter’s Chair were separated by no great interval
from
Septuagesima, he tells us that the Antioch or February celebration was
the more solemn of the
two and that it was called festum beati
Petri epularum, probably the equivalent of a homely phrase which
might be
rendered “St Peter’s beano For”, he goes on, “the pagans of old were
accustomed every year on a certain day in the month of February to set
out a
good meal beside the graves of their relatives, which the demons made
away with
in the night-time, though it was believed not less untruly than
absurdly that
the souls of the dead were refreshed therewith. For men thought that
these
provisions were consumed by the souls that wandered about the graves.
However,
this custom and this false persuasion could hardly be eradicated,
Christians
though they were. Accordingly when certain holy men realized the
difficulty and
were anxious to suppress the custom altogether, they instituted the
feast of St
Peter’s Chair, both of the Roman chair and the chair at Antioch,
assigning it
to the day on which these pagan abominations took place, in order that
this
evil practice might be utterly abolished. Hence it is that from the
spread of
good food then laid out the feast acquired the name of ‘St Peter’s
banquet
day’”.
It is clear that
these allusions to the offerings made at the graveside must all have
reference
to the February feast, and this only makes it harder to understand how
the
feast came to be duplicated. Various suggestions have been offered, of
which
the most plausible seems to be that of Mgr Duchesne, that as the
original
celebration on February 22 often occurred in Lent it could not be
regularly
kept. So “in countries observing the Gallican rite, where Lenten
observance was
considered incompatible with the honouring of saints, the
difficulty may have
been avoided by holding the festival on an earlier date.” For the
selection of
January 18 we may perhaps find a reason in the fact that this day is
the
earliest possible date on which Septuagesima can occur. No doubt if
January 17
had been chosen this would have placed the Chair feast altogether
beyond the
possibility of any concurrence, but there may easily have been
some little
miscalculation in the matter. Although Septuagesima can fall
on January 18, this happens very rarely. It has not
occurred since 1818, and will not occur again until the year 2285.
Further, it
seems highly probable that a feast of the Blessed Virgin is entered in
the
“Hieronymianum” on January 18 for precisely the same reason, and
the
conjecture suggests itself that the feast now known to us as “the
Conversion of
St Paul” was originally a sort of octave of the Chair feast of St
Peter.
Polemius Silvius, it will be remembered, seemed to regard the latter as
concerned with both apostles and called it Depositio
SS Petri et Pauli.
A puzzling feature
in the problem is the fact that though our feast was celebrated at so
early a date
in Rome, it seems at a later period to have disappeared from the Roman
calendar
altogether. It is not in the Gelasian or Gregorian Sacramentaries in
their
original form, nor in the primitive Roman Antiphonarium. It was never
adopted
in Africa or in the East, and we cannot trace it at Monte Cassino or in
Naples.
It may be that the pagan celebration of the Parentalia and the
Charistia in
Rome itself died out before the sixth century, though they lingered on
in Gaul.
In that case, since the feast of the Chair had effected its purpose and
was now
apt to interfere with the reorganized Lenten stations, it may have been
suppressed at Rome in favour of this Lenten scheme. In Gaul, however,
the feast
was retained. In some places it was transferred to January 18, but in
many
calendars it kept its old position on February 22. To explain the
duplication
someone hit upon the idea that if the former celebration commemorated
the
beginning of St Peter’s Roman episcopate, the latter must be referred
to
Antioch, for through the Clementine Recognitions the close
connection of St
Peter with Antioch was widely credited in the fourth and fifth
centuries.
Eventually both feasts were adopted pretty well everywhere in Gaul, and
from
thence it would seem Rome eventually readopted them both, just as Gaul
gave to
Rome the Rogation days and a good many other liturgical features.
See
Abbot Cabrol in DAC., vol. iii, pp. 76—90
Duchesne, Origines du culte chrétien (Eng.
trans.), pp. 279—280 Refiner, Heortology (1908),
pp. 301—308 De Rossi in Bullettino di
archeologia cristiana, 1867, p. 38. See also Belethus, Rationale
div. off.,
in Migne, PL., vol. ccii, cc. 9 seq. pseudo-Augustine
in Migne, PL., vol. xxxix, c. 2102 C. Morin in Revue
bénédictins, vol. xlii, pp. 343—346 CMH., p.
109.
An ancient western custom celebrates the
festival of the
consecration
of a bishop. As the bishop of Rome and head of the universal Church,
Saint Peter's feast is celebrated by Christians in a special way. As to
the fact: few archaeologists now doubt what the Church has always
affirmed, that Saint Peter resumed his work at Rome after his founding
of the see of Antioch (as attested by Eusebius, Origen, Jerome, and
many others).
Peter served as bishop of
Antioch for seven years according
to Saint Gregory the Great.
Together with Saint Paul, Peter
founded a Church at Rome, where he
worked for 25 years and where the two were crowned with martyrdom. It
was at Rome that Peter took his permanent seat of authority. It was
appropriate that Rome should (Encyclopedia).The feast of
Natale Petri de Cathedra was included in the calendar of
Pope Liberius (c. 354), Gregory's sacramentary, and all martyrologies.
We can see that it was celebrated in 6th-century France by its
appearance at the Council of Tours.
According to Husenbeth,
early
Christians, especially in the East,
recalled their baptism on its anniversary.
On their spiritual birthday,
they would renew baptismal vows and render God special thanksgiving for
heavenly adoption. That bishops similarly recalled the anniversary of
their consecration can be seen in four sermons by Saint Leo and the
liturgical celebration of that day for several saints. Today we should
thank God for the establishment of His Church, through which we learn
of His love and by which we are fed daily on the Bread of Heaven and
the word of God. Let us also pray for unity within the Body of Christ
(Encyclopedia, Husenbeth).
February 22, 2010 Chair of Peter the Apostle
This feast commemorates Christ’s choosing Peter to sit in his place as
the servant-authority of the whole Church (see June 29).
After the “lost weekend” of pain, doubt and self-torment, Peter hears
the Good News. Angels at the tomb say to Magdalene, “The Lord has
risen! Go, tell his disciples and Peter.” John relates that when he and
Peter ran to the tomb, the younger outraced the older, then waited for
him. Peter entered, saw the wrappings on the ground, the headpiece
rolled up in a place by itself. John saw and believed. But he adds a
reminder: “..[T]hey did not yet understand the scripture that he had to
rise from the dead” (John 20:9). They went home. There the slowly
exploding, impossible idea became reality. Jesus appeared to them as
they waited fearfully behind locked doors. “Peace be with you,” he said
(John 20:21b), and they rejoiced.
The Pentecost event completed Peter’s experience of the risen Christ.
[T]hey were all filled with the holy Spirit” (Acts 2:4a) and began to
express themselves in foreign tongues and make bold proclamation as the
Spirit prompted them.
Only then can Peter fulfill the task Jesus had given him: “... [O]nce
you have turned back, you must strengthen your brothers” (Luke 22:32).
He at once becomes the spokesman for the Twelve about their experience
of the Holy Spirit—before the civil authorities who wished to quash
their preaching, before the council of Jerusalem, for the community in
the problem of Ananias and Sapphira. He is the first to preach the Good
News to the Gentiles. The healing power of Jesus in him is well
attested: the raising of Tabitha from the dead, the cure of the
crippled beggar. People carry the sick into the streets so that when
Peter passed his shadow might fall on them.
Even a saint experiences difficulty in Christian living. When Peter
stopped eating with Gentile converts because he did not want to wound
the sensibilities of Jewish Christians, Paul says, “...I opposed him to
his face because he clearly was wrong.... [T]hey were not on the right
road in line with the truth of the gospel...” (Galatians 2:11b, 14a).
At the end of John’s Gospel, Jesus says to Peter, “Amen, amen, I say to
you, when you were younger, you used to dress yourself and go where you
wanted; but when you grow old, you will stretch out your hands, and
someone else will dress you and lead you where you do not want to go”
(John 21:18). What Jesus said indicated the sort of death by which
Peter was to glorify God. On Vatican Hill, in Rome, during the reign of
Nero, Peter did glorify his Lord with a martyr’s death, probably in the
company of many Christians.
Comment: Like the committee
chair, this chair refers to the occupant, not the furniture. Its first
occupant stumbled a bit, denying Jesus three times and hesitating to
welcome gentiles into the new Church. Some of its later occupants have
also stumbled a bit, sometimes even failed scandalously. As
individuals, we may sometimes think a particular pope has let us down.
Still, the office endures as a sign of the long tradition we cherish
and as a focus for the universal Church.
Quote: Peter described our
Christian calling in the opening of his First Letter, “Blessed be the
God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who in his great mercy gave us
a new birth to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ
from the dead...” (1 Peter 1:3a).
|
 1297
St.
Margaret of
Cortona Penitent direct contact with Jesus frequent ecstacies (began
1277)
Cortónæ,
in Túscia, sanctæ Margarítæ, ex tértio
Ordine sancti Francísci; quæ admirábili
pæniténtia et ubérrimis lácrimis
máculas anteáctæ vitæ indesinénter
abstérsit. Ipsíus corpus, mirabíliter
incorrúptum, suávem spirans odórem et crebris
miráculis clarum, ibídem magno cum honóre
cólitur.
At Cortona in Tuscany, St. Margaret of
the Third Order of St. Francis. By means of commendable penance
and fruitful tears, she wiped away the stains of her previous
life.
1297 ST MARGARET OF
CORTONA
IN
the
antiphon to
the “Benedictus” in the office of St Margaret of Cortona she is
described as
“the Magdalen of the Seraphic Order”, and, in one of our Lord’s
colloquies with
the saint, He is recorded to have said, “Thou art the third light
granted to
the order of my beloved Francis: He was the first, among the Friars
Minor:
Clare was the second, among the nuns: thou shalt be the third, in the
Order of
Penance.”
She was the daughter
of a small farmer of Laviano in Tuscany. She had the misfortune to lose
a good
mother when she was only seven years old, and the stepmother whom her
father
brought home two years later was a hard and masterful woman who had
little
sympathy with the high-spirited, pleasure-loving child. Attractive in
appearance and thirsting for the affection which was denied her in her
home, it
is not wonderful that Margaret fell an easy prey to a young cavalier
from
Montepulciano, who induced her to elope with him one night to his
castle among
the hills. Besides holding out a prospect of love and luxury he appears
to have
promised to marry her, but he never did so, and for nine years she
lived openly
as his mistress and caused much scandal, especially when she rode
through the
streets of Montepulciano on a superb horse and splendidly attired.
Nevertheless
she does not seem to have been in any sense the abandoned woman she
afterwards
considered herself to have been. She was faithful to her lover, whom
she often
entreated to marry her and to whom she bore one son, and, in spite of
her
apparent levity, there were times when she realized bitterly the
sinfulness of
her life. One day the young man went out to visit one of his estates
and failed
to return. All one night and the next day Margaret watched with growing
anxiety, until at length she saw the dog that had accompanied him
running back
alone. He plucked at her dress and she followed him through a wood to
the foot
of an oak tree, where he began to scratch, and soon she perceived with
horror
the mangled body of her lover, who had been assassinated and then
thrown into a
pit and covered with leaves.
A
sudden revulsion
came as she recognized in this the judgement of God. As soon as she
possibly
could she left Montepulciano, after having given up to the relations of
the
dead man all that was at her disposal (except a few ornaments which she
sold
for the benefit of the poor); and, clad in a robe of penitence and
holding her
little son by the hand, she returned to her father’s house to ask
forgiveness
and admittance. Urged by her stepmother, her father refused to receive
her, and
Margaret was almost reduced to despair, when she was suddenly inspired
to go to
Cortona to seek the aid of the Friars Minor, of whose gentleness with
sinners
she seems to have heard. When she reached the town she did not know
where to go
and her evident misery attracted the attention of two ladies, Marinana
and
Raneria by name, who spoke to her and asked if they could help her. She
told
them her story and why she had come to Cortona, and they at once took
her and
her boy to their own home. Afterwards they introduced her to the
Franciscans,
who soon became her fathers in Christ. For three years Margaret had a
hard
struggle against temptation, for the flesh was not yet subdued to the
spirit,
and she found her chief earthly support in the counsel of two friars,
John da
Castiglione and Giunta Bevegnati, who was her ordinary confessor and
who
afterwards wrote her “legend”. They guided her carefully through
periods of
alternate exaltation and despair, checking and encouraging her as the
occasion
required. In the early days of her conversion, she went one Sunday to
Laviano,
her birthplace, during Mass, and with a cord round her neck asked
pardon for
her past scandals. She had intended also to have herself led like a
criminal
through the streets of Montepulciano with a rope round her neck, but
Fra Giunta
forbade it as unseemly in a young woman and conducive to spiritual
pride,
though he subsequently allowed her to go to the church there one Sunday
and ask
pardon of the congregation. He also restrained her when she sought to
mutilate
her face, and from time to time he tried to moderate her excessive
austerities.
“Father,” she replied, on one of these occasions, “do not ask me to
come to
terms with this body of mine, for I cannot afford it. Between me and my
body
there must needs be a struggle till death.”
Margaret
started to
earn her living by nursing the ladies of the city, but she gave this up
in
order to devote herself to prayer and to looking after the sick poor.
She left
the home of the ladies who had befriended her, and took up her quarters
in a
small cottage in a more secluded part, where she began to subsist upon
alms.
Any unbroken food that was bestowed upon her she gave to the poor, and
only
what was left of the broken food did she use for herself and her child.
Her
lack of tenderness to her boy seems singular in one who showed such
tenderness
to other people, but it may well be that it was part of her
self-mortification.
At the end of three years her earlier struggles were over, and she
reached a
higher plane of spirituality when she began to realize by experience
the love
of Christ for her soul. She had long desired to become a member of the
third
order of St Francis, and the friars, who had waited until they were
satisfied
of her sincerity, at length consented to give her the habit. Soon
afterwards
her son was sent to school at Arezzo, where he remained until he
entered the
Franciscan Order. From the time she became a tertiary, St Margaret
advanced
rapidly in prayer and was drawn into very direct communion with her
Saviour.
Her intercourse with God became marked with frequent ecstasies and
Christ
became the dominating theme of her life. Fra Giunta has recorded a few
of her
colloquies with our Lord and has described some of her visions, though
he
acknowledges that even to him she spoke of them with reluctance and
only when
divinely ordered to do so or through fear of becoming the victim of
delusion.
The
communications she received did not all relate to
herself. In one case she was told to send a message to Bishop William
of
Arezzo, warning him to amend his ways and to desist from fighting with
the
people of his diocese and Cortona in particular. Though he was a
turbulent and
worldly prelate he appears to have been impressed, for he made peace
with
Cortona soon afterwards and this was generally attributed to Margaret’s
mediation. In 1289 she strove to avert war when Bishop William was
again at
strife with the Guelfs. Margaret went to him in person but this time he
would
not listen, and ten days later he was slain in battle. The bishop had,
however,
done one good turn to Margaret and to Cortona, for in 1286 he had
granted a
charter which enabled her to start putting her work for the sick poor on a
permanent basis. At first she seems to have nursed them by herself in
her own
cottage, but after a time she was joined by several women, one of whom,
Diabella, gave her a house for the purpose. She enlisted the sympathy
of
Uguccio Casali, the leading citizen of Cortona, and he induced the city
council
to assist her in starting a hospital called the Spedale di Santa Maria
della
Misericordia, the nursing sisters of which were Franciscan tertiaries
whom
Margaret formed into a congregation with special statutes; they were
called the
Poverelle. She also founded the Confraternity of Our Lady of Mercy,
pledged to
support the hospital and to search out and assist the poor.
As Margaret advanced
in life, so did she advance in the way of expiation. Her nights she
spent,
almost without sleep, in prayer and contemplation, and when she did lie
down to
rest, her bed was the bare ground. For food she took only a little
bread and raw
vegetables, with water to drink; she wore rough hair-cloth next her
skin and
disciplined her body to blood for her own sins and those of mankind. In
spite
of the wonderful graces which she received Margaret had to endure
fierce trials
throughout her life. One of them came upon her unexpectedly some eight
years
before her death. From the first there had been certain people in
Cortona who
doubted her sincerity, and they continued to do so even after she had
so evidently
proved the reality of her conversion. At last they began to cast
aspersions on
her relations with the friars, especially with Fra Giunta, and managed
to stir
up such suspicions that the veneration in which she was held was
temporarily
turned to contempt and she was spurned as a madwoman and hypocrite.
Even the
friars were moved by the general indignation restrictions were laid on
Fra
Giunta’s seeing her, and in 1289 he was transferred to Siena, only
returning
shortly before her death. This trial was intensified by the withdrawal
of the
sense of sweetness in prayer. There had been further misunderstandings
with the
friars when she had retired the previous year by divine command to a
more
retired cottage at some distance from the friars’ church. According to
Fra
Giunta, they realized that her health was broken and feared lest they
might
lose the custody of her body after her death. All these trials she bore
quietly
and meekly and gave herself more and more to prayer. Thus she was led
on ever
higher.
Towards the latter
part of her life, our Lord said to St Margaret, “Show now that thou art
converted; call others to repentance. . . . The graces I have
bestowed on thee
are not meant for thee alone.” Obedient to the call, she set about
attacking
vice and converting sinners with the greatest eagerness and with
wonderful
success. The lapsed returned to the sacraments, wrongdoers were brought
to
repentance and private feuds and quarrels ceased. Fra Giunta says that
the fame
of these conversions soon spread, and hardened sinners flocked to
Cortona to
listen to the saint’s exhortations, not only from all parts of Italy,
but even
from France and Spain. Great miracles of healing too were wrought at
her
intercession, and the people of Cortona, who had long forgotten their
temporary
suspicions, turned to her in all their troubles and difficulties. At
length it
became evident that her strength was failing, and she was divinely
warned of
the day and hour of her death. She received the last rites from Fra
Giunta and
passed away at the age of fifty, after having spent twenty-nine years
in
penance. On the day of her death she was publicly acclaimed as a saint,
and the
citizens of Cortona in the same year began to build a church in her
honour.
Though she was not formally canonized until 1728, her festival had been
by
permission celebrated for two centuries in the diocese of Cortona and
by the
Franciscan Order. Of the original church built by Nicholas and John
Pisano
nothing remains but a window; the present tasteless building, however,
contains
St Margaret’s body under the high altar and a statue of the saint and
her dog
by John Pisano.
The
main historical
source for the life of St Margaret is the “legend” of Giunta
Bevegnati; it
seems probable that in MS. 61 of the convent of St Margaret at Cortona
we have
a copy of this corrected by the hand of the author himself. The text is
in the Acta Sanctorum, February, vol. iii; but
it has been re-edited in more modern times by Ludovic da Pelago (1793)
and E.
Cirvelli (1897). See also Father Cuthbert, A
Tuscan Penitent (1907); Leopold de Chérancé, Marguerite de Cortone (1927); M. Nuti, Margherita
da Cortona: la sua leggenda e Ia storia (1923); F. Mauriac, Margaret of Cortona (1948); and
another life in French by R. M. Pierazzi (1947).
Margaret
of Cortona, penitent, was born in Loviana in Tuscany in 1247.
Her father was a small farmer. Margaret's mother died when she was
seven years old. Her stepmother had little care for her high-spirited
daughter. Rejected at home, Margaret eloped with a youth from
Montepulciano and bore him a son out of wedlock. After nine years, her
lover was murdered without warning. Margaret left Montpulciano and
returned as a penitent to her father's house. When her father refused
to accept her and her son, she went to the Friars Minor at Cortona
where she received asylum. Yet Maragaret had difficulty overcoming
temptations of the flesh. One Sunday she returned to Loviana with a
cord around her neck. At Mass, she asked pardon for her past scandal.
She attempted to mutilate her face, but was restrained by Friar Giunta.
Margaret earned a living by nursing sick ladies. Later she
gave this up
to serve the sick poor without recompense, subsisting only on alms.
Evenually, she joined the Third Order
of St. Francis, and her son also
joined the Franciscans a few years later. Margaret advanced rapidly in
prayer and was said to be in direct contact with Jesus, as exemplified
by frequent ecstacies. Friar Giunta recorded some of the messages she
received from God. Not all related to herself, and she courageously
presented messages to others.
In 1286, Margaret was granted a charter
allowing her to work for the sick poor on a permanent basis. Others
joined with personal help, and some with financial assistance. Margaret
formed her group into tertiaries,
and later they were given special
status as a congregation which was called The Poverelle ("Poor Ones").
She also founded a hospital at Cortona and the Confraternity of Our
Lady of Mercy. Some in Cortona turned on Margaret, even accusing her of
illicit relations with Friar Giunta. All the while, Margaret continued
to preach against vice and many, through her, returned to the
sacraments. She also showed extraordinary love for the mysteries of the
Eucharist and the Passion of Jesus Christ.
Divinely warned of the day
and hour of her death, she died on February 22, 1297, having spent
twenty-nine years performing acts of penance. She was canonized in
1728.
Margaret of Cortona, OFM Tert. (RM) Born in
Laviano
(Alviano?),
Tuscany, Italy, 1247; died in Cortona, Italy, February 22, 1297;
canonized by Benedict XIII in 1728.
Margaret of Cortona was raised in a poor farm family by her
cold
stepmother after her own mother died when she was seven. The harshness
of her stepmother, combined with beautiful Margaret's indulged
propensity to seek pleasure, led her into seduction by nobleman of
Montepulciano when she was 18. She followed him to his castle and
became his mistress for nine years, always hoping that he would make
good his promise to marry her.
She would ride arrogantly out of his castle, dressed in fine
silks and
despising the poor. She longed to marry the young man, but he refused,
even when she bore him a son. One day he failed to return to the
castle. Two days later his dog returned alone. He plucked at her dress
until Margaret followed him through a wood to the foot of an oak tree,
where he began to scratch.
To her horror, she found the
disfigured,
decaying body of her lover in the leaf- covered pit where his murderers
had thrown him.
The sight of this rotting
carcass, who had been her gallant, struck her
with such terror of the divine judgment and the treachery of this world
that she became a perfect penitent. When he died, she was evicted from
his castle, and gave back all his gifts.
In despair she publicly
confessed her sins, dressed herself as a penitent, and then tried to
atone for her sins by infinite goodness to the poor and prayer.
Unsure of her next step,
she returned to her father's home with her
son. She threw herself at his feet bathing them in tears to beg his
pardon for her contempt of his authority and fatherly admonitions. She
spent days and nights in tears. She also attempted to repair the
scandal she had caused by going to the parish church with a rope around
her neck and asking public pardon.
Her father wished to take her
back,
but her stepmother refused to have such a public sinner under the same
roof.
Driven away in shame, she
was tempted to give up her good resolves, but
she prayed, and an inner voice bade her go at once to Cortona and to
confide the care of her soul to the Franciscans. On the way she met two
ladies, Marinana and Raneria Moscari,
who listened to her story. Moved
with pity, they took the mother and her son into their home and care.
Later they introduced her to the Franciscans, who soon became her
fathers in Christ and they arranged for her son's education at Arezzo
(he later became a Franciscan). For three years Margaret struggled
diligently against temptation.
She was supported in her task by
the
counsel of two friars, John da Castiglione and Giunta Bevegnati, who
was her confessor and later her biographer.
Now, under the severest
mortifications, Margaret began her mystical
ascent. The wise Franciscans tried to make the distraught woman modify
her extreme grief and penances that disfigured her body.
Eventually
Margaret's peace of mind returned. She began to experience the love of
Jesus and to believe that her sins had been forgiven.
Margaret earned her living
by nursing the ladies of Cortona, but later
gave this up in order to devote herself more fully to prayer and to the
corporal work of mercy of caring for the sick poor in her own small
cottage. She lived in seclusion on the alms of others. Any unbroken
food that she received, she gave to the poor. For herself and her son,
Margaret kept only the scraps.
She wanted to become a tertiary
of the Friars Minor, but they made her
wait for three years before giving her the Franciscan habit. From
the
time she became a tertiary, Margaret advanced rapidly in prayer and was
drawn into very direct communion with her God. Thus,
her ecstatic life
began in 1277. Christ set her up as an example to sinners and her
influence was amazing--many flocked to her for counsel.
She received from Christ
these words: "I
have made you a mirror for
sinners. From you will the most hardened learn how willingly I am
merciful to them, in order to save them. You are a ladder for sinners,
that they may come to me through your example. My daughter, I have set
you as a light in the darkness, as a new star that I give to the world,
to bring light to the blind, to guide back again those who have lost
the way, and to raise up those who are broken down under their sins.
You are the way of the despairing, the voice of mercy."
From near and far came sin-plagued folk to hear from
Margaret a word of
comfort and counsel. Margaret sent them to the Franciscans and
particularly to her confessor, who was later her biographer. When he
complained that there were so many of these people, Margaret heard the
words: "Your confessor has forbidden you to send him so many men and
women who have been converted through your words and tears. He said to
you that he could not clean so many stables in one day. Say to him that
when he hears confession he does not clean stables, he prepares for me
a dwelling in the souls of the penitent."
Not only did the living come to her, so did the dead. The
illustrious
penitent Margaret distinguished herself by her charity to the suffering
souls in Purgatory. They appeared to her in great numbers to ask her
assistance. One day she saw before her two travellers, who begged her
help to repair injustices they had committed: "We are two merchants,
who have been assassinated on the road by brigands. We could not go to
confession or receive absolution; but by the mercy of our Divine Savior
and His Holy Mother, we had the time to make an act of perfect
contrition, and we have been saved. But our torments in Purgatory are
terrible, because in the exercise of our profession we have committed
many acts of injustice. Until these acts are repaired we can have no
repose nor alleviation. This is why we beseech you, servant of God, to
go and find such and such of our relatives and heirs, to warn them to
make restitution as soon as possible of all the money which we have
unjustly acquired." They gave the holy penitent the necessary
information and disappeared.
The communications Margaret received did not all relate to
herself. In
one case she was told to send a message to Bishop William of Arezzo,
warning him to amend his ways and to stop fighting with the people of
his diocese and living like a worldly prince and soldier rather than a
shepherd of souls. Often Margaret was able to mediate in factional
disputes and make peace. In 1289, she strove to avert war when Bishop
William was again at strife with the Guelfs. Margaret went to him in
person but he would not listen. Ten days later he was killed in battle.
She established an association of women to act as nurses and
men to
finance hospitals for the poor. In 1286, Bishop William of Arezzo gave
permission for a whole community of women (whom she called the
'Poverelle') to develop her initiative on a permanent basis. At first
Margaret nursed the poor in her own home. Then a lady named Diabella
proved a house. The town councilors, at the urging of Uguccio Casali,
gave money with which Margaret founded a hospital, Spedale di Santa
Maria della Misericordia, for the poor dedicated to Our Lady of Mercy.
About 1289, false and
vicious rumors were spread about her relations to
the friars. Father Giunta was transferred to Siena, but it was later
proven that the rumors were the evil work of gossips, and the holiness
of her life became apparent to all. Not only did people come to her for
counsel, but also for healing.
The more advanced Margaret became spiritually, the greater
were her
self-imposed penances. By the end of her life she slept very little and
only on the bare ground; ate only bread and raw vegetables with water
to drink; wore a rough hair-shirt next to her skin, and used the
scourge freely on herself.
It is recorded that at the time of her death at age 50,
Margaret saw
the many souls that she assisted out of Purgatory form a procession to
escort her to Heaven. God revealed this favor granted the Saint
Margaret through a holy person of Castello. This servant of God, rapt
in ecstasy at the moment of Margaret's death, saw her soul in the midst
of this brilliant cortège, and on recovering from her rapture,
related the vision to her friends.
On the day of her death, after 29 years of doing penance,
she was
publicly proclaimed a saint. That same year the citizens of Cortona
began to build a church in her honor. All that is left of this original
church built by Nicholas and John Pisano is a window.
When the holy penitent died, her corpse was embalmed and
solemnly
entombed. But people wished to see and venerate the body more closely.
Therefore, in 1456, it was taken out of its old shrine, freed of all
dust that could have seeped in, newly dressed, and placed so that it
was possible to take it out easily and expose it for veneration. Her
body is still preserved under the high altar of a new church of which
she is the titular patron. The edifice also contains a statue of her
and her dog by John Pisano (Attwater, Benedictines, Bentley, Cuthbert,
Delaney, Encyclopedia, Farmer, Husenbeth, Martindale--Queen's
Daughters, Mauriac, Schamoni, Schouppe, Walsh, White).
In art, Saint Margaret has a dog pulling at her dress and a
skull or
corpse at her feet. Sometimes she may be shown (1) in a checkered
habit, black cloak, and white veil; (2) with a cross and scourge; (3)
in an ecstasy with Christ appearing to her (Roeder); or in ecstasy with
angels supporting her (White).
She is the patroness of penitent
women (Roeder).
|
Saints of this Day February
22 Octávo Kaléndas Mártii. 
Quote: Pope
Paul
VI’s 1969 
Benedict XVI met with Aram I Catholicos of Cilicia,
the highest authority of the Orthodox Church. The
Pope remembered the martyrs of the Armenian Church and the Armenian
genocide, without explicitly mentioning it, and denounced the
persecution of Christians in modern times. Benedict
XVI
As
we watch the
spectacle of the world
seeming to self-destruct before our eyes, we can’t help but be saddened
and even frightened by so much evil run rampant. Iraq, Lebanon,
Afghanistan, Somalia, North Korea—It is all a disaster of epic
proportions displayed in living color on our television screens. 
