Today is the Feast of St. Catherine of Siena!

Courtesy WikiCommons, CC0.

If you're unfamiliar with this marvelous saint, I highly suggest you become un-unfamiliar. Once again I recommend this biography by Nobel Laureate Sigrid Undset.

Quick facts to whet your palette:

1. Catherine had a naturally cheerful disposition. We also surmise that she was her mother's favorite child.

2. Speaking of, Catherine's mother was loving but overbearing. Monna Lapa did not understand her daughter or her daughter's vocation and her tears and interference often tested Catherine's patience.

3. Catherine's father was more understanding of her strange vocation; he made provision for her to live as a hermit for a time in a 3-by-9 foot room at the back of their house - a luxury for a medieval middle-class family.

4. Catherine was a mystic early in her life.

5. Though Catherine was a Dominican, she was not a nun. Instead, Catherine was part of a Sienese Dominican tertiary group known as the Mantellate. Until Catherine joined, the Mantellate only included widows among their ranks; Catherine's desire to take vows of virginity as a Mantellate caused quite a stir.

6. She also caused quite a stir by traipsing unladylike around Siena, and then the world, doing works of mercy: feeding the poor, tending the sick, and admonishing Popes.

7. Consequently, a lot of people distrusted her. She didn't let it stop her.

8. Catherine is commonly credited with convincing Pope Gregory XI to leave Avignon and return to Rome.

9. Catherine had the stigmata, though hidden.

10. Though she could not read, Catherine wanted to pray the Divine Office so badly that God gave her the grace of doing so.

11. Catherine thought her inability to eat anything other than the Eucharist was a trial, not a super-cool miracle.

12. Catherine wrote to everyone. Thanks to the ready assistance of several secretaries, she kept up a lively correspondence with hundreds of people, from world leaders to friends back home.

13. Pope Paul VI named Catherine a Doctor of the Church in 1970.

Bonus: in honor of the 800th anniversary of the Order, all members of the Dominican family who participate in a Jubilee celebration or make a pilgrimage to the churches and chapels of the Dominican family can receive a Plenary Indulgence. And the feast of St. Catherine is a good day to do so! We don't have anything Dominican-y around here, but my husband rearranged his work schedule today so that I can at least get to Mass. Good man.

St. Catherine of Siena, pray for us!

The Transfiguration, Rubens. Via WikiCommons, CC0.

In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. (John 1:1)

From Kanon for the Fifth Day of Great Week, Ninth Ode, by St. Cosmas of Maiuma:

The Father begot me, creative Wisdom, before the ages;
He established me as the beginning of his ways
For the works now mystically accomplished
For though I am the uncreated Word by nature,
I make my own the voice
Of the nature I have now assumed.

As I am a man
In reality, not a mirage,
So divinized is the nature which,
By the manner of the exchange,
Is united to me.
Wherefore know that I am one Christ
Who saves that of which and in which I am.

From Ancient Christian Commentary on Scripture, NT Vol. IVa, ed. Joel C. Elowsky, 5.

Update: A friend gave me some congenial pushback on my theosis claim - he suggested that this passage is specifically about the hypostatic union (that Christ is one person with two natures) and not about theosis, per se. I initially read this as, "So divinized is the nature (human nature in general) which, / By the manner of the exchange, / Is united to me." But he may be right.

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“You are the salt of the earth; but if salt has lost its taste, how shall its saltness be restored? It is no longer good for anything except to be thrown out and trodden under foot by men.

“You are the light of the world. A city set on a hill cannot be hid. Nor do men light a lamp and put it under a bushel, but on a stand, and it gives light to all in the house. Let your light so shine before men, that they may see your good works and give glory to your Father who is in heaven" (Mt. 5:13-16).

I am a coward.

No, really. I am. I fear and hate confrontation with a passion that, if instead was directed toward evil, would move mountains and save the world. As opinionated and outspoken as I can be, I usually only voice those opinions with trusted friends. I talk a good game, but can I play ball? Eh... heh.

I write this because I'm seeing our collective cultural insanity coupled with politics-as-usual coming home to our quiet West Michigan town, sending my old devil, anxiety, through the roof. It's hard not to fret.

At some point I may be called to stand up and say, no, that's not right, to be salt and light. And that terrifies me. To quote St. Thomas More in A Man For All Seasons, "This is not the stuff of which martyrs are made."

But God is gentle with the brokenhearted. When he asks of us more than we can give, he will give us what we lack. He is our source of peace.

I know this. But why is it so hard to believe sometimes?

For the sake of Christ, then, I am content with weaknesses, insults, hardships, persecutions, and calamities; for when I am weak, then I am strong (2 Cor. 12:10).

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From The Desert Fathers (ed. Benedicta Ward):

Lot went to Joseph and said, 'Abba, as far as I can, I keep a moderate rule, with a little fasting, and prayer, and meditation, and quiet: and as far as I can I try to cleanse my heart of evil thoughts. What else can I do?' Then the hermit stood up and spread out his hands to heaven, and his fingers shone like ten flames of fire, and he said, 'If you will, you can become all flame' (131).

Those of us who struggle with scrupulosity (myself included) fret about religious minutiae and often overdo our religious observance in an attempt to justify and perfect ourselves from our sins, real and perceived. Our fear of sin causes a great deal of anxiety; we struggle to know Christ's freedom.

The monk Lot shows us what the first step toward holiness looks like for the scrupulous person: a moderate (moderate!) rule, a little fasting, prayer, meditation, quiet, and cleansing our hearts of evil thoughts as far as is humanly possible (because having evil thoughts is sometimes outside our control).

Most importantly, Lot shows us the importance of seeking out spiritual direction, which St. Alphonsus Liguori says is necessary for the person suffering from scruples.

But as Abba Joseph shows us, there is more to Christian salvation than Lot's pious life. If we will, we can become all flame. This is theosis in a nutshell. Salvation is more than being saved from sin. Salvation is being saved for unity with God. And unity with God means being drawn into him to the point that we become him.

In Jesus our humanity has been united to God, which is to say that our humanity is united to divinity. God can do this without violating his nature as Creator or our nature as creature because he stands outside his creation. He is other and can therefore enter into his creation as he wills. He does not cease to be God; we do not cease to be his creatures. And yet we become him.

When we turn our attention from being saved from to being saved for, we discover how much God is fighting for us. For me, this was the single most important turning point in my struggle against scruples. When my spiritual director told me to meditate every day on God's love for me, I discovered that God isn't ready to jump on me for each and ever fault and failing. He is loving and patient with me because He wants - wants! - to give me his very self.

When I began to believe this, I began to experience freedom, despite those pesky scruples. I have learned that I can ignore my doubts (so hard to do, by the way) because God wants me to know the freedom he offers in Christ. By God's grace, if I keep my eyes on him, I too will become all flame.

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From today's Office of Readings:

From the treatise On the Trinity by Saint Hilary, bishop
(Lib. 8, 13-16: PL 10, 246-249)

We believe that the Word became flesh and that we receive his flesh in the Lord’s Supper. How then can we fail to believe that he really dwells within us? When he became man, he actually clothed himself in our flesh, uniting it to himself for ever. In the sacrament of his body he actually gives us his own flesh, which he has united to his divinity. This is why we are all one, because the Father is in Christ, and Christ is in us. He is in us through his flesh and we are in him. With him we form a unity which is in God.

How then can we fail to believe that he really dwells within us? Because we can only see two inches in front of our noses. Because the weight of our sin binds us to anxiety and fear.

I need to be reminded, over and over, that God is for us. Who can be against us? He united himself to my weakness. I need not be afraid of his just punishment if I remember that my weakness is my strength.