United States or Qatar ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
This became a constant refuge for the saint from the overcrowded Benincasa household, and the scene of more than one charming episode in her life as told by the legend. For the Mantellate, or tertiaries of St. Dominic, were not cloistered, nor did they take the monastic vows; they simply lived in their own homes a life of special devotion.
In 1368 her father dies, and the Revolution puts an end to the prosperity of the Benincasa family, which is now broken up. Catherine seems to have retained to the end the care of Monna Lapa. In 1370 she dies mystically and returns to life, having received the command to go abroad into the world to save souls. Her reputation and influence increase. A group of disciples gathers around her.
And so it happened after the decree relative to Saint Giangiuseppe had been pronounced in the Vatican basilica by His Holiness Pius VI, in the presence of the assembled cardinals. Involuntarily one contrasts this heavenly largesse with the sordid guineas which would have contented an English lawyer. . . . Or glance into the biography of the Venerable Sister Orsola Benincasa.
The vision of human fellowship in the Name of Christ, for which Catherine lived and died, remains the one hope for the healing of the nations. On March 25th, Catherine, and a twin-sister who dies at once, are born in the Strada dell' Oca, near the fountain of Fontebranda, Siena. She is the youngest of the twenty-five children of Jacopo Benincasa, a dyer, and Lapa, his wife.
They spring from the problems of her active life; they bring her renewed strength and wisdom for her practical duties. An age, which like our own places peculiar emphasis and value on the type of sanctity which promptly expresses itself through the deed, should feel for Catherine Benincasa an especial honour.
The times were indeed evil, and the "servants of God," of whom then, as now, there were no inconsiderable number, withdrew for the most part into spiritual or literal seclusion, and in the quietude of cloister or forest cell busied themselves with the concerns of their own souls. Not so Catherine Benincasa. She had known that temptation and conquered it.
They constitute, surely, a precious heritage of the Church for which her life was given. Catherine Benincasa died heartbroken; yet in the depths of her consciousness was joy, for God had revealed to her that His Bride the Church, "which brings life to men," "holds in herself such life that no man can kill her."
Barnabei, a contemporary writer, states that Giorgio also built the adjoining Palazzo Benincasa. He must have gone backwards and forwards between Italy and Dalmatia, for in 1455, while he was under contract with the Sebenico authorities, he completed the fine façade of S. Francesco alle Scale, Ancona, receiving a bonus of 70 ducats above the price, according to Lando Feretti.
But if we may judge from the nature of the reflections addressed to him, the spiritual instruction by which Benincasa was capable of profiting was extremely elementary in character.
Giovanna of Naples was one of the most depraved, as well as one of the most romantic, figures of her time. In fascination, as in evil, she anticipates the type of the women of the renascence. Her many crimes had never prevented Catherine Benincasa from yearning over her with a peculiar tenderness, and we have many letters written by the daughter of the dyer of Siena to the great Neapolitan queen.
Word Of The Day