A message was sent to the church, to tell Fra Bartolommeo de Dominici that he must come at once to Catherine, for her friends were sure that she was at the point of death. Fra Bartolommeo and another Dominican, Fra Giovanni, had to elbow their way through the crowd outside her home, for people had streamed to the house when it was rumoured in the town that their holy virgin was dying. Round Catherine’s bed knelt her nearest friends, weeping and lamenting. Fra Tommaso della Fonte, Fra Tommaso Caffarini, Madonna Alessia and Madonna Lisa and several others were there. The sorrowing Italians expressed their pain in violent weeping and loud cries, and it made such a deep impression on the consumptive young Fra Giovanni that he had a terrible attack of haemorrhage of the lungs. But full of confidence in God and His holy bride, Tommaso della Fonte took Catherine’s hand and laid it on the breast of the sick monk. The haemorrhage stopped at once. A moment later Catherine opened her eyes, looked round her with an expression of deep disappointment—and turned to the wall and wept.
She wept unceasingly for many days. But little by little she told Tommaso della Fonte something of what she had experienced when she lay as though dead. She was quite certain that her soul had been freed from its prison of flesh and blood; she had seen a little of the pain and the burning desire of the souls in purgatory who know that the time will come when they shall possess God as He is, but as yet are cut off by their deeds and thoughts from that revelation which is blessedness itself. She had seen the agonies of the lost souls in hell, and for a moment she had tasted the joy of the blessed in heaven.
But at the gates of heaven Jesus had met her and commanded her to return to the world and tell what she had seen. But to explain these things as they really are is impossible for the human tongue—we have no words which can express such great mysteries. All she could do was to proclaim to the world how great was Our Lord’s love to herself and all souls, how terrible are the agonies of hell, and how purgatory burns the souls which sorrow over their sins and long to be united with Him who they know is the only thing worth desiring. Many years later Catherine said to Raimondo that she loved her sufferings, for they would lead her to more complete unity with Christ.
Finally Christ had said to her: “There are many whose salvation depends on you. The life you have led up to now will be altered: for the sake of the salvation of souls you will be required to leave your native town, but I shall always be with you—I shall lead you away, and I will lead you back again. You shall proclaim the honour of My name to rich and poor, to clerks and laymen, for I shall give you words and wisdom which no one can resist. I shall send you to the popes and the leaders of My Church and to all Christians, for I choose to put the pride of the mighty to shame by the use of fragile tools.”
It is not strange that Catherine asked her confessor at times, “Father, can you not see that I have changed? Can you not see that your Catherine is no longer the same?”
Some time in August 1370 three of Catherine’s brothers, Benincasa, Bartolommeo and Stefano, left Siena to settle in Florence. There they were registered as citizens and continued the family’s trade—dyeing—apparently with very little success. Some years later Catherine had to ask her Florentine friend Niccolo Soderini to help them with a loan. But it seems as though they were continually in debt. Catherine was forced to write to Benincasa that he ought not to ask their old mother for help: “She has given you your body, nursed you and suffered great pains and troubles for your sake and for all our sakes.” It must have been a cause of great sorrow to Catherine that Bartolommeo’s wife Lisa—the only one of her relations who after her father’s death was really close to her—had to accompany her husband to Florence and take the children with her.
Those members of the family who remained in Siena—there was at least one brother and possibly some of the brothers-in-law who tried to continue the business in the old home—cannot have been lucky either. It was not long before they had to move from the old house in Via dei Tintori. It seems that from that time Catherine lived with various women friends until the time came which her Bridegroom had prepared her for during her mystical death, and she was sent out to wander by many strange roads.
But it was most probably while she was still living in her home at Fontebranda that her meeting with the Franciscan Fra Lazzarino took place. He was lecturer in theology at the college of his order in Siena, and a very popular preacher. Perhaps the old professional jealousy between the two mendicant orders had something to do with it—the Franciscan was at any rate professionally jealous of Fra Bartolommeo de Dominici, who was lecturer in theology in the Dominican monastery. Fra Lazzarino boiled with rage over all this nonsense about the Benincasa girl who was supposed to be so holy. He raged against Catherine in his sermons, and against the circle of friends who had collected round her—the “Caterinati”, as the town had christened them. He was preparing for a last great attack on the charlatan—for that is what he was sure she was; and therefore he decided to go and visit her. He did not doubt for a moment that it would be an easy matter for him to unmask the ignorant young girl as a hypocrite or a heretic.
He was impudent enough to ask Fra Bartolommeo if he could arrange a meeting with Catherine. The unsuspecting Dominican thought that perhaps the Franciscan had begun to realise that he had done Catherine an injustice, so he gladly went with Fra Lazzarino down to the Via dei Tintori. It was late in the afternoon, but Catherine politely asked the Franciscan to seat himself. He sat on the wooden chest, Fra Bartolommeo on the edge of the bed, and Catherine sat on the bare floor at the feet of her guest.
Fra Lazzarino began with a stream of flattery. “I have heard so much about your holiness—about how Our Lord has breathed into your soul a deep understanding of Holy Writ, so now I have come to beg you to offer me words of consolation and edification.”
No one on earth was less moved by flattery than Catherine. She replied modestly and calmly to the polite request, and begged the monk to talk to her, to strengthen and instruct her miserable soul. They continued to fence in this manner for some time. The Franciscan never managed to catch the young lay sister in any heretical or even suspicious utterance, and he had obviously not the faintest idea that the modest young girl saw right through him. When the church clocks all over the town began to ring for the Angelus, the two mendicant monks had to leave their hostess. Catherine followed them politely to the door, fell on her knees and asked Fra Lazzarino for his blessing, “and of your mercy, pray for me”. The self-assured monk carelessly made some semblance of the sign of the cross over the kneeling woman, and mumbled absent-mindedly “and pray for me too, Sister”.
That night Fra Lazzarino slept badly, and when he got up early to prepare his lecture, he felt extraordinarily sad and out of spirits. This feeling grew, and suddenly he burst into violent weeping. He detested all expressions of emotion and was terribly ashamed of himself—but he could not stop weeping. He had to cancel his lecture and stay in his cell, and as his tears continued to stream ceaselessly he tried to discover the reason for this unnatural attack of depression. Perhaps he had eaten and drunk too well yesterday evening—or perhaps he was going to start a very bad cold, for when he lay down to sleep the evening before he had forgotten to draw his hood up over his tonsured skull. Or perhaps this strange attack had been sent him from above to warn him that there was bad news on the way from his native town, Pisa; perhaps his mother or his brother was dead or in terrible danger? And last of all he began to wonder if, without knowing it, he had offended God in some way or other?
He remained in his cell the whole day. Towards evening it suddenly dawned on him—he remembered Catherine’s bare little cell, and the young girl herself who had sat so modestly on the bare floor at his feet; he remembered how she had knelt and asked for his blessing. . . And how coldly and proudly he had gesticulated and mumbled without meaning it “pray for me, Sister”. . . and Catherine had prayed for him.
He looked round him. His cell was in fact two cells which had been joined into one, so that he
could have a pleasant study, furnished with bookshelves, a good bed and comfortable chairs. Because he was not guilty of any of the obvious sins which so many of the town’s clergy committed in the very faces of the faithful, he had considered that he was a good and upright monk. He had served his Lord and Master with his lips, but Catherine lived as he preached. Yes, she had love, burning love for God, and for His sake for all His creatures. She suffered for the sins of mankind, for his sins, too; she was poor as his father Francis had been, she was chaste, honest and holy. Now he saw her as she was.
And immediately the storm in his mind was stilled. He had acknowledged the truth about himself, and now he could look it in the face without unmanly tears. With the first light of dawn Fra Lazzarino hurried down to the house in the Via dei Tintori. Catherine came and opened the door to him, and when he threw himself on his knees before her she knelt also. They went into her cell together, sat on the floor and talked of their Master, and the monk confessed how up to now he had held the shell of faith in his hands, while she had the core. While Catherine talked to him, as tenderly and gently as to a son, peace fell upon Fra Lazzarino’s soul. She reminded him of the vows he had made when young—vows of which his coarse cowl, the rope round his waist, and his bare feet were the symbol. “Follow your father St. Francis; his way is the way of salvation for you”, said Catherine.
Fra Lazzarino went home and gave all his surplus possessions to the poor; he sold his books and gave away his furniture. He retained for himself only the most necessary clothes and one or two books for which he really had use. Of course he became the object of much scorn, criticism and ridicule—for now he did not know how to praise sufficiently the little Sister of Penitence whom he had scorned so heartily the day before. Fra Lazzarino was not perturbed by the scorn and ridicule. But some years later he retired to a life of solitude outside Siena, from which he occasionally emerged to preach, and his sermons were even better than they had been before. Catherine and Fra Lazzarino continued to be faithful friends ever after.
IX
EVER SINCE SHE HAD GIVEN UP her solitary life Catherine had been continuously busy with the corporal works of mercy. But from the day when her soul had left her body on its mystical journey through hell, purgatory and heaven, she knew that her call was first and foremost to practise spiritual works of mercy. When Christ chose her and Himself trained her, showed her such great confidence and gave her such unusual gifts of grace, He did this in order to forge her into a weapon which He could use in the battle for the souls of men.
It seems that the first of the miraculous conversions which Catherine achieved through her prayers, and which caused a sensation far beyond the city walls of Siena, was that of Andrea de Bellantis. He was an immensely rich young man of noble birth, and a complete scoundrel, so depraved that the whole town talked of him—and the good citizens of Siena were used to depravity among the young nobles. Andrea de Bellantis was a drunkard, a gambler, a perpetrator of violence, and a terrible blasphemer. He would not listen to a word about religion, and had had nothing to do with the Church since he became a man. In December 1370 he was suddenly taken very ill, but when the parish priest came, as his duty was, to visit him, Andrea drove him from the room where he lay with a flood of swearing and blasphemy. His family then sent for Tommaso della Fonte, but he was not able to move the young man to repentance either. Andrea told his relations that he intended to die as he had lived. Fra Tommaso then went to Catherine to beg her to pray for a soul which was about to die in mortal sin.
Catherine was in ecstasy when the monk came to her house, and the women who were with her told him that Catherine had also been in ecstasy that morning, and that then she had looked into heaven and seen how the hosts of heaven were preparing to celebrate the feast of St. Lucy, which was to take place the following day. Fra Tommaso gave the women his message and asked them to pass it on to Catherine when she regained consciousness.
Early the next morning Fra Tommaso heard that Andrea de Bellantis had died a repentant sinner, strengthened with the sacraments of the Church, and that he had made a will and disposed of his fortune as a good Christian should. Andrea had said to those who stood round his bed that he saw his Saviour standing in a corner of the room, and beside Him stood “the Mantellata whom they call Catherine”. Christ appeared as a stern judge and said that Andrea’s sins were so terrible that justice must take its course. But the maiden prayed for Andrea; she even begged to be condemned herself if only Christ would save this young man’s soul. Andrea’s stony heart was seized with repentance for his sins, he sent for a confessor, and died reconciled with his Creator.
Catherine admitted to Tommaso that this had really happened. While she knelt in her cell storming the gates of heaven with prayers for Andrea de Bellantis, in spirit she had been in the dying man’s room with Christ, and she had offered to take on herself the punishment for his sins in eternity if only Christ would have mercy on Andrea. At first Fra Tommaso was not inclined to believe this story. But Catherine described the young man whom she had never seen, and the room where he had died, where she had obviously never been, but which Fra Tommaso knew all too well after his sad and vain visit to the sick man.
“No one should think it strange”, she said later to Raimondo of Capua, “that I have such a great love for every soul, for I have truly bought these souls very dear, since for their sake I am willing to remain here on earth parted from my Lord.”
But after the events of the eve of St. Lucy came a period of complete fasting—for several months Catherine was unable to take any form of food whatsoever. She lived only on the Blessed Sacrament, and was completely outside this world. Vision followed vision, and she returned to the world around her only when she had to carry out some task given her by her Lord. Although her physical strength ebbed from her and she often seemed so weak that her friends were afraid that she was dying, Catherine herself was sure that she would not be called away yet. Christ would always give her the strength she needed to carry out His wishes.
At the beginning of 1371 Catherine lived with her friend Alessia Saracini for several months. Alessia was a widow and had her father-in-law, Francesco Saracini, living with her. He was now over eighty, a hardened sinner and a fanatical hater of the clergy. Only once in his life had he been to confession, when he had been dangerously ill, but afterwards he laughed at his weakness and swore never to do such a thing again. There was a certain prior in Siena whom he looked upon as his archenemy: “If I ever meet the fellow I will kill him.”
During the long winter evenings Catherine sat with the old gentleman and listened to him scoffing at religion and thundering against all priests. Catherine made no attempt to argue; instead she spoke to him of Jesus Christ, of His love towards mankind, His bitter death, and the saving power of His sacraments which He has put in charge of the Church, and which remain unchanged even though the priests who administer them may be bad and unworthy men. Finally she won; Francesco said he would be reconciled with her Lord Jesus. Catherine said he would be forgiven all his sins if he forgave all who had offended him.
Early the next morning Francesco Saracini took his most precious falcon, and with the noble bird sitting on his wrist went to the church in the monastery where his enemy was prior. He decided that the first-fruit of his conversion should be the burying of his hatred, and as a proof of his sincerity he meant to give his most valuable falcon to his one-time enemy. But when the prior saw old Saracini, the poor man ran for his life—Saracini had to explain to the other priests why he had come and get them to go and fetch him back. When he had been assured that Saracini was unarmed, the prior, who was not outstandingly heroic, came to meet him, but he trembled with fear as he received the priceless gift from the penitent old man. Saracini returned to Catherine and told her what he had done—“and what must I do now?” She sent him to Fra Bartolommeo de Dominici to confess. For three days Fra Bartolommeo listened to the general confession in which Francesco Saracini admitted all the sins he had committe
d in the godless eighty years he had lived.
Obedient as a soldier to his young “mamma” Francesco went to Mass in the cathedral every morning, and afterwards said one hundred Pater Nosters and one hundred Ave Marias, with a rope with a hundred knots which Catherine had given him. He lived another year, and then died quietly and peacefully.
One morning during the same winter Alessia was standing at the window looking down into the street when she suddenly gave a shriek. “Oh, Mother, what an awful sight, right outside our door! They are driving two condemned men on waggons and they are being tortured with red-hot tongs. . . . ”
The men were two notorious robbers who had finally been caught and tried. The list of their crimes was so unbelievably horrible that they had been condemned first to be tortured and then put to death. This day they were driven round the whole town; they stood, each in his waggon, chained to a stake, while the executioner’s apprentices pricked them with red-hot iron forks and tore the flesh from their limbs with burning tongs. Instead of shouting to the spectators for pity as most criminals did on the way to execution, these two shouted curses and blasphemed God so that all who heard them shuddered with fear.
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