Siena, Italy, Dec 26, 2018 / 05:02 am (CNA/EWTN News).- When St. Catherine of Siena was alive in 14th century in what is now Italy, it looked like it was the end of the world.
The Bubonic plague was sweeping through Europe in waves, which would ultimately wipe out 60 percent of the population. The Papal States were divided and at war. Rich churchmen were buying their positions; bishops were making sure their family members would succeed them. The pope had been living in France for 70 years, and though he would return to Rome, the Western Schism happened shortly after, with three claimants to the See of Peter.
“She lived in really terrible times,” Fr. Thomas McDermott, O.P., a St. Catherine of Siena scholar, told CNA. “And people really did think it was the end of the world.”
The state of the world, and the Church today, is different, though in some ways no less troubled. The new wave of sex abuse scandals and their alleged cover-ups have rocked anew the Church throughout the world.
When St. Catherine talked about the Church, she often referred to it as the Body of Christ, in the tradition of St. Paul, McDermott noted.
“She says the face of the Church is a beautiful face, but we’re pelting it with filth,” he said. “It has a beautiful face, that’s the divine side of the Church, but we human beings are pelting it; we’re disfiguring the body of Christ through our sins.”
While the current abuse crisis and related scandals have left many lay Catholics wondering how to respond, some Catholics have suggested looking to the saints – like Catherine of Siena – for guidance.
Who was Catherine?
Catherine was born March 25, 1347, the 25th child born to middle-class parents in Siena; about half of her siblings did not survive childhood.
At a young age, she became very devout, and resisted her parents when they attempted to have her marry the husband of one of her sisters who had died. Instead, she chose to fast and cut off her hair to make herself less desirable. She would ultimately vow her virginity to Christ, and experienced a mystical marriage to him around the age of 21.
Instead of entering a convent, however, Catherine chose to live a life of prayer and penance at home as a tertiary, or third order, Dominican. She spent several years in near-seclusion, in a cell-like room under the steps in her parents’ house, spending her days in dialogue with Christ.
After several years of this at-home novitiate of sorts, while in her mid-20s, she heard Christ telling her to lead a more public life.
“He said now you have to go out and share the fruits of your contemplation with others,” McDermott said. “That’s very Dominican, it’s from the Summa of St. Thomas Aquinas.”
Catherine obeyed, and rejoined her family in their daily activities. She also began to serve the poor, and soon became renowned for her charitable works. She gathered a following of young men and women – many of them from rich families of high social status – because they enjoyed her warm personality and her holiness.
Catherine goes public – and gets political
Once she stepped back into a more public life, she became more connected and in tune with the happenings in the Church.
At the time, Gregory XI was living in Avignon and was at war with the Republic of Florence. He placed it under interdict; essentially the equivalent of excommunicating a city – they were cut off from receiving the sacraments, among other sanctions.
Through her life of prayer and her consultation with her spiritual directors, Catherine began corresponding with papal representatives and the pope himself, attempting to broker peace in Florence and advocating for reform where she saw corruption.
“The papal nuncio to Florence in Catherine’s time is grossly hated by the powerful families in Florence, and he’s hated because the powerful families feel that they’ve been mistreated by the Pope,” said Catherine Pakaluk, an associate professor of economics at Catholic University of America and a devotee of St. Catherine.
“She’s writing to the nuncios, she’s writing to the pope, and she’s trying to prevent this internal Catholic war between these parts of the Papal States,” she said. “And this is before the Great Schism when things get really bad.”
Tempers and tensions were so high that the papal nuncio of Florence was eventually skinned alive in the streets.
“So when we think about things today and how shocking and horrifying (they are), you know, things were pretty bad then,” Pakaluk noted. “The nature of the particular crimes is different, but the tensions were really high and these folks were quite violent.”
Catherine was drawn into the Church politics of her time not because of a misplaced sense of ambition, McDermott said, but because she loved the Church as she loved God.
“It wasn’t her motive to be involved in the politics of the Church, but what was best for everyone and for the church led her into politics,” he said. “But it’s not like she was interested in politics itself.”
As part of her attempts at solving the problems of the Church, Catherine joined the call of many other Catholics of the time for the Pope to return to Rome.
After some correspondence, Catherine set out on foot with her followers to go meet with the pope in person.
“It was a remarkable thing for Catherine who was a homebody to take off on foot for France with her disciples, but she was prepared to do anything for the Church because the Church was the Body of Christ,” McDermott said.
After scores of people pleading with the pope to return to Rome between 1309 and 1377, St. Catherine seemed to prove most persuasive.
During her visit, Catherine referenced parts of the pope’s dream, about which he had told no one.
“It was astounding to him (that she knew about the dream) and he took that as a clear sign from God that he was speaking to him through this woman,” McDermott said. So after decades of exile, within a few weeks of Catherine’s visit, the pope packed up his things and headed back to Rome.
“She’s a great example of a laywoman who had strong convictions about the Church and was not timid about expressing them,” said Dr. Karen Scott, an associate professor of Catholic Studies and History at DePaul University in Chicago.
“It was a very different situation from today, so it would be a mistake to think that it’s an automatic equivalent” to the problems of the current Church, Scott told CNA.
“She was living a long time ago and it was a different time and a different Church and different historical set of circumstances…but she was aware of all sorts of problems with the clergy and she believed they ought to be reformed.”
The legend of the opinionated laywoman
What Catherine excelled at in her correspondence with the pope and other clergy was her ability to balance her no-punches-pulled critiques with her profound respect for the Church and the papacy, Scott said.
“There’s a beautiful balance between clear thinking and the ability to see the flaws…but at the same time to be enormously respectful of the Church and the papacy in particular and to base all of this on her deep spiritual life, a life of deep prayer,” Scott said.
“She’s a laywoman who had strong opinions and views on (Church matters) and took action, and amazingly they paid attention,” Scott added. Amazingly, because she was an uneducated lay woman from a modest background who wasn’t particularly well-known.
“They listened to her because what she was saying was so obviously right and sincere and coming out of her prayer and the Gospel,” Scott said.
In total, Catherine wrote at least 381 letters in her lifetime. Three years before her death, she also began dictating “Il Libro” (“The Book”), a collection of her spiritual teachings and conversations with God that became known as “The Dialogue”.
A significant portion of her Dialogue, chapters 110-134, gives insight into her thoughts on the Church reforms needed at the time. Catherine relayed that the “Eternal Father” (how she frequently refers to God the Father) had told her that the biggest problem facing the secular priests of her time was money, while the biggest problem facing priests in religious orders was homosexuality.
Her frank critiques were considered so indelicate that they were excised from many of the English translations of her book, McDermott said.
“She was writing this in the 1300s, she believes it was dictated to her by the Eternal Father, and she’s always a direct hitter, she doesn’t hold anything back,” McDermott said.
But while her dialogues contain punchy critiques of the clergy, she also urged respect for them at the same time, as they are “Christs” on earth who bring Jesus to the world through the Eucharist.
“You should love them (priests) therefore by reason of the virtue and dignity of the Sacrament, and by reason of that very virtue and dignity you should hate the defects of those who live miserably in sin, but not on that account appoint yourselves their judges, which I forbid, because they are My Christs, and you ought to love and reverence the authority which I have given them,” the Eternal Father told Catherine, as recalled in her Dialogue.
While Catherine was successful at bringing the papacy back to Rome and brokering peace between Florence and the Eternal City, the period known as the Great Schism, or the Western Schism, would begin just two years before her death.
“It wasn’t crystal clear who the real pope was,” McDermott said, noting that even some saints who are now canonized had sided with opposing claimants at the time. “So that must have also seemed like the end of the world.”
“St. Catherine was totally horrified,” Scott said, “because for her, Church unity was really essential.”
During this time, French cardinals had elected a leader as the Pope, and later on, the Council of Pisa also elected a claimant. St. Catherine sided with the claimant residing in Rome, Urban VI, and moved there in the last few years of her life to advocate for him and offer intense prayer and penance for the Church.
When she died in 1380, a result of illness brought on by her extreme penances, the western Church was still in schism, and would remain that way until the conclusion of the Council of Constance in 1418.
“Some historians, I think specifically less faithful ones or who don’t have a life of faith…will say well Catherine really failed, because her goal was to bring the Pope back to Rome to heal the divisions in the Church, but how could she have succeeded if the greatest schism of the Western Church occurs after she dies?” Pakalu said.
“I don’t know that’s quite the right view. We never know the hypothetical of history, we never know what would have happened without Catherine’s influence, and she does at least initially bring the Holy Father back to Rome before she died and that was pretty important,” she said.
“My guess is that the Church was able to survive the Great Schism because she got certain things lined up before she died.”
Catherine’s lessons for Catholics today
“What would she say today? I think that’s a dangerous question,” Scott said, “because we can’t say how she would relate to the current issues and complex questions, except that she would know very well what the moral stance is, that bishops and priests and lay people should all follow.”
Catherine would set the highest of standards for honesty and integrity and pastoral concern for the laity, Scott said, as well as the highest standards “for avoiding schism and being close to the papacy.”
“Beyond that I think she would advise people to take the time to pray and discern and not have knee-jerk reactions to things,” she added.
Pakaluk said that she thinks there are three lessons to be learned from Catherine’s life and example, with the first being that any activist role in Church politics must be rooted in deep prayer and love for the Church.
“I wouldn’t say don’t get involved until you’re as holy as Catherine … but to do activism or public ministry without that deep commitment to prayer would be completely absurd and would not be faithful to her life or her example,” she said.
The second lesson, she said, would be to take the long view of history. The Church has survived hard times and scandal before, and she can survive them again.
“I am horrified at outraged at what I’m seeing and hearing about” regarding the current scandals, Pakaluk said.
“But I’m not personally disturbed, my faith isn’t challenged, because I’m so familiar with (ages) in the Church’s past, particularly and especially the one that Catherine lived through, in which there was so much corruption and so much disappointment on the part of the faithful with respect to the hierarchy and some members of the clergy,” she said.
“So it doesn’t disturb me because I think well, why would it be different? Why would we think we’re better? Why do we think we’re completely immune to some of the things that have occurred in the past?”
The third thing Catholics can learn from St. Catherine is that it is possible to be a saint even in the most trying times in the Church, Pakaluk said.
“She’s there in Heaven, she ran the race, she made it,” she said. “We can look at her not only like ‘we can do it too’, but she’s our older sister, and we can follow her and ask her to intercede for us.”
McDermott said that Catholics should be heartened by St. Catherine’s witness because even while she prolifically wrote about the problems of the Church, she never once hinted that she was thinking about leaving.
“She would’ve said don’t leave the Church, this is the human, sinful side of the Church that is being reflected. And the good of the church – stay and purify it,” he said.
“Our love for Christ and the Church – the two are inseparable – is shown in hard times when it doesn’t feel very good to be a Catholic, that we keep on walking with Christ and the Church.”
This article was originally published on CNA Sept. 16, 2018.
[…]
Would that there were an abundance of German bishops the likes of layman Marc Frings.
Would that there were a pope like this layman.
Would that there would be more Catholics like the Pope.
Fr. Peter Morello:
My understanding is that there are quite a number of bishops in the German formerly Catholic Church who are *precisely* the ilk of layman Frings.
Like Herr Frings, these bishops dispute the ancient teachings of the Church, revering sterile, lifeless, orgasmo-centric homosexual practices, placing them on a par with the generative and sacred marriage act.
Please, Fr. Peter, could you explain for me why so many Catholic leaders who defy the Church’s teachings and who dispute the revealed word of God in scripture, feel compelled to present themselves as Catholics?
When it’s blatantly obvious that their real objective is to destroy the Catholic Church.
Brineyman I’m aware of the faithful German bishops, Stefan Oster Passau, Rainer Woelki Koln and others. Perhaps we can attribute the reason why the radicals control German Church politics to Vatican support of the kingpin of German radicalism Cardinal Reinhard Marx, and a growing lax practice of laity, the many who quit the Church due to the tax system. Oblique support by Pope Francis [letters of admonition have zero effect if not followed by action] of radical theologian and chairman German Bishops Conference Bishop Georg Bätzing who promotes the Synodal Way is a key.
We’re overshadowed in America by a cloud of apostasy promoted by a nucleus of key appointments to the cardinalate Tobin, Farrell, Cupich, Gregory, McElroy who possess political power directly from Rome promoting the Vatican secularist approach to the faith. Primarily it’s political control exerted from the Vatican.
Insofar as strong orthodox commitment to the faith there are the known nucleus of Cordileone, Naumann, Aquila, just a handful, the majority who express doctrinal orthodoxy are also weak and fearful of reprisal, preferring to remain token and comfortable. It all comes down to papal leadership, that leadership taking us in the opposite direction of Benedict and John Paul II.
It seems what’s occurring is a form of chastisement [ancient Israel was frequently permitted to degrade itself punished then restored] for overall laxity among Catholics.
I think you have misread Herr Fringes. He is actively supporting changing the catechism. Why would you want German bishops like him?
I had the same reaction and the same question. And, unfortunately, It seems that there is already an abundance of quisling German Bishops like Herr Frings.
Precisely, DUANE and Tom.
It seems that a huge number of Catholics — including bishops — don’t actually believe what the Catholic Church teaches.
With so many non-Catholic churches out there, why don’t these anti-Catholic Catholics just join another, more forward-thinking, now-a-go-go faith community?
I’m sure they could find one that preaches just about any gospel they like. Including the insemination of whatever body cavity they desire.
cc: Archbishop Wilton Gregory, Washington, D.C.
Why doesn’t the German Catholic Church get on with it and separate itself from the Catholic Church? It’s inevitable, so why belabor it?
Follow the money…
As long as the churchy tribe in Germania remains part of the Catholic Church it is eligible for the 7-8% surcharge on the annual personal income tax collected by the state and then sent to the German bishops’ conference. Therefore, now that the tribe has crossed the Rubicon in faith and morals, Rome should inform the Federal Republic of Germany that the tribe is no longer part of the universal Catholic Church.
Several consequences might follow:
1. Those fewer dioceses openly loyal to the universal Catholic Church would continue to receive the state-collected (and reduced, see #4) financial support, at least 13 judging from earlier synodal voting (Historically, it would be the ugly 1648 Peace of Westphalia all over again!)
2. Parishes loyal to the Church, but located in self-amputated dioceses, still could be identified as mission parishes attached to the nearest Catholic diocese, regardless of defunct diocesan boundaries.
3. Because the self-amputated dioceses are no longer part of the Church, Catholics who in the past have been automatically excommunicated (for refusing to be financially complicit in the betrayal of the Body of Christ) would find their excommunications either moot or lifted by Rome. (And loved ones who have been denied the sacrament of Catholic burial would receive justice from the restored and intact Church.)
4. Since the “indefensible” penalty (wording from the writings of emeritus Pope Benedict) has been removed, parishioners of Catholic dioceses and parishes could refuse the tax without penalty, and instead could contribute directly to the Church.
Yes, just a fantasy. And, more sober minds than mine surely will find a less risky exit strategy from today’s standoff, but follow the money.
Brilliant!
As background reading, we might consider what the International Theological Commission had to say about synods, compared to the synodal workbook. This language from the ITC (“Synodality in the life and mission of the Church,” 2018):
“…It is essential that, taken as a whole, the participants give a meaningful and balanced image of the local Church, reflecting different vocations, ministries, charisms, competencies, social status and geographical origin. The bishop, the successor of the apostles and shepherd of his flock who convokes and presides over the local Church synod, is called to exercise there the ministry of unity and leadership [!] with the authority which belongs to him [!].” (n. 79).
By comparison, the vademecum portrays the bishops—the successors of the apostles—not so much with authority or even leadership but, instead, “primarily as facilitators.” Beware, it warns, of the “scourge of clericalism.” What then of the apostolic Church?
From fully ten months ago and 5,000 miles away from Germania, here’s a CWR “opinion” piece on what has been abundantly obvious, from even a non-credential layman: https://www.catholicworldreport.com/2021/10/02/opinion-making-sense-of-synodal-steps-during-precarious-times/
Thank God that our Good Lord having foreseen the evils of our times , has also given us the remedy – as the revelations of the Divine Will , as expalined in the enthusiatic words of Rev.Fr.Jim Blount –
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7vibJv58LMs
The Book of Heaven and related writings , to help deal with the spirit of apostacy as manifested in the unholy demands , from the blatant denial of the role of The Spirit Sanctifier in The Church and the world .. ( ? Russian money and envy also at the root .. )
Well meaning persons in the German Church , starting a process to immerse all those who have become afflicted with the spirits of confusion / envy / hatreds ,
to get to read the above volumes .. Church speeding up the process to update the volumes in a manner so that same can be more widely used – ? Lord allowing these drunken howlings in the ‘Field hospital ‘ for The Church as a whole to be led in haste to the healing waters ..good to hear how the Holy Father used the innovative measures of lasers and magnet therapy for healing of the knee fracture ..The Light of the Divine Will and the grace to cherish its truths to choose to live same – may same bring speedy enough healings into all the broken and wounded lives in the Field hospital .
FIAT !
God tests us to see if our faith is strong and resilient. Will it withstand attacks of evil and will it endure for the sake of the church? The church is worth fighting for. Unrepentant sinners (after being warned three times) must be put out of the church. God in His mercy shows us the path. We should continue to pray for them, yet they have no kinship with those who strive for godliness and look to Jesus to cleans us of our unrighteousness.Words are one matter, actions can be the opposite. God judges the hear, we must be in submission to Christ.
Excommunication is there for a reason. Sone may argue it might begin with Marx. Yet, he appears to be a Papa favourite, Papa declining his resignation. Others may argue that he has gone from awful to abhorrent and yet, will Papa do what is required?
2 Timothy 3:13 While evil people and impostors will go on from bad to worse, deceiving and being deceived.
Philippians 1:1-Paul and Timothy, servants of Christ Jesus, To all the saints in Christ Jesus who are at Philippi, with the overseers and deacons: Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. I thank my God in all my remembrance of you, always in every prayer of mine for you all making my prayer with joy, because of your partnership in the gospel from the first day until now. …
Galatians 1:1-Paul, an apostle—not from men nor through man, but through Jesus Christ and God the Father, who raised him from the dead— and all the brothers who are with me, To the churches of Galatia: Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ, who gave himself for our sins to deliver us from the present evil age, according to the will of our God and Father, to whom be the glory forever and ever. Amen. …
2 Timothy 3:12 Indeed, all who desire to live a godly life in Christ Jesus will be persecuted,
Blessings of discernment and honour.
“Defamatory and outdated statements of Church doctrine on sexuality and gender need to be revised on the basis of theological and human-scientific findings.”
This is the constant declarative statement made by the German Synod.
Where is the objective ‘outdatedness’ other than a desire to be in the constant and current culture?
And where are these ‘human-scientific findings’? The manipulative soft sciences of psychology and sociology?
Fear not. German Catholics opposed to the Bishops and groups who hijacked the German meetings, prepared a manifesto. Our Pope Francis arranged a public meeting with some of those who signed the manifesto thus showing a strong degree of papal support for this group. When the time comes, the views of the German Bishops and their backers in this attack against the Church, will be publicly rejected. This is why our Founder gave us this Rock and the Holy Spirit.
Can man error? Can those in exalted positions go astray? Censure has come from many quarters regarding Papa’s watch.
Jesus had his critics and He has is faithful followers. Hopefully we rebuke ourselves, and when our fellow man is admonished, it is an aid to his eternal soul. Loyalty is good, however fidelity to Christ is always best and expected from the born again Christian.
When we care for someone we pray for them that they may be guided aright. Let our prayers for Papa be constant, that he do all things according to Christ.
1 Corinthians 10:4 And all drank the same spiritual drink. For they drank from the spiritual Rock that followed them, and the Rock was Christ.
1 Corinthians 3:11 For no one can lay a foundation other than that which is laid, which is Jesus Christ.
Matthew 21:42 Jesus said to them, “Have you never read in the Scriptures: “‘The stone that the builders rejected has become the cornerstone; this was the Lord’s doing, and it is marvellous in our eyes’?
John 3:3 Jesus answered him, “Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born again he cannot see the kingdom of God.”
John 3:7 Do not marvel that I said to you, ‘You must be born again.’
1 Peter 1:23 Since you have been born again, not of perishable seed but of imperishable, through the living and abiding word of God;
Titus 3:5 He saved us, not because of works done by us in righteousness, but according to his own mercy, by the washing of regeneration and renewal of the Holy Spirit,
John 3:36 Whoever believes in the Son has eternal life; whoever does not obey the Son shall not see life, but the wrath of God remains on him.
Romans 6:23 For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.
How do you read the words of our Lord?
Prayers and blessings as you walk honouring Christ.
The chastisement of the confusion that the German Church is facing , also allowed in aching patience by the Holy Father to manifest itself , ? from concern also for other cultures that face imbalances in male / female #s , brought on by other evils .
The Church still has the responsibility to take the Good News to such places too to help them to know The Truth that The Spirit as the Sanctifier has the Love and Power in Him to help do away with confusions such as in seeing lust as Love , that in The Heart of The Mother , there can be ever greater unity in The Spirit to Love God and others , with His Own Will and Love that ever multiplies and substitutes ..
the labor pains as fears and unholy demands allowed to be voiced out since these arguments could very well be fermenting in other cultures who could be attracted to the goodness that can be through The Church , yet afraid that it is an impossibilty to live in holiness ..
The Divine Will revelations and readings – given for our times for persons to grasp the richness and depth of what faith entails . The Church likely expecting same to get to be known better through various means , including from the concerns about the wounded in the field hospitals who are demanding anaesthetics / narcotics even when such can be deadly . Holy Father and The Church knows there are healthier choices – Light more powerful than Laser as the Flame of Love of The Mother to attract hearts with greater power than that of gravity to rise up in the Divine Will healed of fractures of hearts ,to live in the manner destined for the children .
FIAT !