I have always loved the fact that because of the sheer number of saints of the Church (those who are officially recognised and those who we will one day meet in Heaven) there is always a saint who has shared his or her experience of my own particular sufferings and joys. I am encouraged by the fact that saints are human like myself, and, though during their lives they were far holier and cooperated with God’s grace far more readily that I do, they are real people who had very real personalities. I first encountered the fiery personality of St Catherine of Siena when I was young and she has kept me company throughout my life; sharing lessons and challenging me along the way.
I still remember very clearly one day, when I was about ten years old and had come home from school hot and bothered about an injustice I had experienced in the school yard, my mother and I sitting down to afternoon tea and debriefing about whole sordid ordeal (such are the agonies of a ten year old!). After giving me her love and advice, Mum told me that I could always pray and ask the saints for help. When I questioned why they would possibly even care about me, Mum told me that they did because as Catholics we have a friendship with the saints. That was a revolutionary idea: a friendship with the saints! Ten year old me wondered how that was possible and what it would look like. I knew the stories of the saints but had yet to really connect with one in particular.
It was around this time in my life that I first encountered the story of St Catherine of Siena in one of the books of saints we had in our house. I was an avid reader and when I first read her story it seemed to leap off the page, so remarkable were the quantity and scope of her talents. She was the second-youngest of 25 children, a contemplative mystic, a political adviser and diplomat, received a spiritual stigmata (she had no physical signs but bore the pain of it) and was instrumental in bringing Pope Gregory XI back to Rome from Avignon in 1377. She also founded a women’s monastery in Siena and authored spiritual writings, which helped her to be named a Doctor of the Church by Pope Paul VI in 1970. She accomplished all this before she was 33, when she died.
To a young, strong-willed girl like myself, I was enthralled by the story of this incredible young woman. I loved the story of her cutting off her hair in protest when her parents started to seek out potential suitors for her marriage, so set was she on devoting her life to Christ instead. I chose her life to be an example for mine (thus showing my naivety about how ‘grand’ my life would be!) and when it came time to choose a Confirmation saint, there was no doubt in my mind: it had to be St Catherine of Siena.
My life has progressed and while the fiery personality that Catherine and I share still burns bright within me, it has at times been somewhat dampened by the recognition that the circumstances of my life as I live it are very different from this 14th century woman. I have achieved none of the incredible things she did, nor even come close! Using her life to guide mine appears to have been an utter failure! So what is it then that makes me, now almost thirty years old, living a quiet, unremarkable life, continue to love Catherine so much and share a strong friendship with her?
I think it is that, for all Catherine’s outward achievements, she was completely and utterlydevoted to a relationship with Christ. From a young age, all she wanted to do was to stay in her bedroom and live in quiet contemplation of Him. She would have been happy to live her life within those four walls and just love Him. Yet, she was obedient to God’s will that she live a life in service outside those walls and therefore she used her extraordinary gifts for the public good of the Church and its people. Yes she visited popes, advised political leaders and wrote spiritual masterpieces, but these were fruits only possible because of her relationship with Christ.
It is an important reminder to me, a young woman who so often feels the burden of needing to do ‘great things’ in the world to please God, that first and foremost Christ desires a relationship with me. He may also want me to do those great things and in the right time offer the opportunity to do so, but Catherine’s love for God points me towards contemplation of Him as the foundation for my life. She reminds me that ‘you are rewarded not according to your work or your time, but according to the measure of your love’.
~ Christina Pretty
Christina is a married thirty-something Melbournian with a penchant for heavy philosophy infused with inane pop culture. She studied History and Classics at university, and later completed a degree in Theological Studies from the John Paul II Institute. She can be found in any good cafe with a book and a skinny flat white coffee.