S. Catherine of Siena on living the life of grace

“All the way to Heaven is heaven, 

because He said, ‘I am the Way.’" 

- S. Catherine of Siena (1347-1380)

Today is the heavenly birthday of S. Catherine of Siena. Born in 1347, the 24th child of a wool dyer in northern Italy, she was very sensitive to spiritual realities from childhood. From the age of six she could see guardian angels as clearly as the people they protected. S. Catherine became a Dominican tertiary when she was sixteen, and continued to have visions of Jesus, Mary, and the saints. She could also discern the presence of demons. Although she had no formal education - being more or less illiterate - she was one of the most brilliant theological minds of her day, and she sent letters to many major public figures. She also carried on a long correspondence with Pope Gregory XI.

In fact, at this very difficult time in the Church’s history, S. Catherine persuaded the Pope to go back to Rome from Avignon, in 1377. In 1375 she received the Stigmata, which was visible only after her death. Catherine’s spiritual director was Raymond of Capua. Her letters, and a treatise called “A Dialogue” are considered among the most brilliant writings of the saints.

S. Catherine died on 29th April, 1380, when she was only 33, and her body was found incorrupt in 1430. Her tomb is under the altar in the Church of Santa Maria Sopra Minerva, in Rome.

'She burned with the love of God and her neighbour. As an ambassador she brought peace and harmony between cities. She fought hard to defend the liberty and rights of the Popes and did much for the renewal of religious life. She also dictated books full of sound doctrine and spiritual inspiration. In 1970 Pope Paul VI declared S. Catherine a Doctor of the Church.' (Universalis)

God created us a second time 

in giving us the life of grace

From a Letter of S, Catherine of Siena to Blessed Raymond of Capua

This is the divine truth: we were created for the glory and praise of God’s name, to enable us to participate in God’s eternal beauty and to sanctify us in God. And the proof that this is the truth? The blood of the spotless Lamb. How are we to know this Blood? By self-knowledge.’

I know of no means of savoring the Truth and living with it, without self-knowledge. It is this knowledge which makes us really understand that we are nothing, that our being came from God when we were created in God’s image and likeness; and also that God created us a second time in giving us the life of grace through the blood of the only Son, blood which has shown us the truth of God the Father.

We were the earth where the standard of the cross was planted. We were the vessel that received the blood of the Lamb as it streamed from the cross. Why did we become that earth? Because the earth would not hold the cross upright; it would have refused such a great injustice. The nails could not have held the Lord fixed and nailed had not his love for our salvation held him there. It was love on fire with the glory of his Father and with desire for our salvation which fixed him to the cross. So we are the earth which held the cross upright and the vessel which received the blood.

We who can recognize this and live as the spouse of this Truth will find grace in his blood, and all the richness of the life of grace; our nakedness will be the nuptial garment; we will be invested with the fire of love, because the blood and fire mingle and penetrate one another; it is love which has united the blood with the divinity and poured it out.

We must live in simplicity, with neither pretensions nor mannerisms nor servile fear. We must walk in the light of a living faith that shines in more than mere words—and always so, in adversity as well as in prosperity, in times of persecution as well as in times of consolation. Nothing will be able to change the strength or the radiance of our faith if Christ who is the Truth has given us knowledge of truth not just in desire but in living experience.

S. Catherine's Prayer to the Trinity

Eternal God, eternal Trinity,
you have made the blood of Christ so precious 

through his sharing in your divine nature. 

You are a mystery as deep as the sea; 

the more I search, the more I find, 

and the more I find the more I search for you. 

But I can never be satisfied; 

what I receive will ever leave me desiring more. 

When you fill my soul I have an even greater hunger, 

and I grow more famished for your light. 

I desire above all to see you, the true light, as you really are.

I have tasted and seen the depth of your mystery 

and the beauty of your creation 

with the light of my understanding. 

I have clothed myself with your likeness 

and have seen what I shall be. 

Eternal Father, you have given me a share in your power 

and the wisdom that Christ claims as his own, 

and your Holy Spirit has given me the desire to love you. 

You are my Creator, eternal Trinity, and I am your creature. 

You have made of me a new creation 

in the blood of your Son, 

and I know that you are moved with love 

at the beauty of your creation,

for you have enlightened me.

Eternal Trinity, Godhead, mystery deep as the sea, 

you could give me no greater gift than the gift of yourself. 

For you are a fire ever burning and never consumed, 

which itself consumes all the selfish love that fills my being. 

Yes, you are a fire that takes away the coldness,

 illuminates the mind with its light 

and causes me to know your truth. 

By this light, reflected as it were in a mirror, 

I recognise that you are the highest good, 

one we can neither comprehend nor fathom. 

And I know that you are beauty and wisdom itself. 

The food of angels, you gave yourself to man in the fire of your love.

You are the garment which covers our nakedness, 

and in our hunger you are a satisfying food, 

for you are sweetness 

and in you there is no taste of bitterness, O triune God!

S. Bridget on the miracle of the Mass

Today in the Church's calendar we celebrate S. Bridget of Sweden (1303-1373). From the age of seven her heart had been smitten by the love of Jesus revealed to her in the visions she had of his death on the cross. His love for her became the foundation of her whole life. Married, and the mother of eight children, she was part of the court of the Swedish King Magnus II. Bridget constantly strove to exert her good influence over Magnus - not entirely successfully. But when her husband died, she received as a gift from Magnus land and buildings with which to found a monastery for men and women, which in time expanded into the Order known as the Bridgetines.

In 1350 Bridget braved a plague-stricken Europe to make a pilgrimage to Rome. She never returned to Sweden. But, humanly speaking, her years in Rome were far from happy, as she was frequently in debt, and many opposed her work to overcome the abuses in the Church of the time.

Bridget died in 1373. while on a final pilgrimage to the Holy Land. 

She was one of many strong female leaders in the medieval Church. Notice that her personal relationship with the Lord, and her experience of visions and mystical life of prayer, did not isolate her from contentious affairs of the world and the Church. Her life is a testimony to the possibility of a holy life in the world of politics and the marketplace.

One of S. Bridget's visions is of the fellowship we have with the angelic powers at Mass, as well as the effect of the Eucharistic Sacrifice on the demons of hell. I believe these realities are part and parcel of every Mass. Imagine how fervent our prayer and devotion would be if we really thought that! Here is what S. Bridget wrote:                            

“One day, when a priest was celebrating Mass, 

I saw, at the moment of Consecration, 

how all the powers of heaven were set in motion. 

I heard, at the same time, a heavenly music, 

most harmonious, most sweet. 

Numberless Angels came down, 

the chant of whom 

no human understanding could conceive, 

nor the tongue of man describe. 

They surrounded and looked upon the priest,

 bowing towards him in reverential awe. 

The devils commenced to tremble, 

and took to flight 

in greatest confusion and terror.”

Our spiritual warfare

During times of personal struggle, church difficulties, or global conflict, it is all too easy for us to abandon basic Christian insights when trying to understand what is happening. The same goes when we are attempting to discern the response we should make. In our time many first world churches of a very wide range of traditions seem hell-bent on accommodating themselves to current secular world views on key issues, rather than gently and lovingly, but firmly, adhering to what God has revealed.  

It seems to me that one of the key passages of Scripture for us to constantly revisit in our day is Ephesians 6:10-13, in which S. Paul reminds us of the struggle with evil that is part and parcel of being a Christian:

Finally, be strong in the Lord and in the strength of his might. Put on the whole armor of God, that you may be able to stand against the wiles of the devil. For we are not contending against flesh and blood, but against the principalities, against the powers, against the world rulers of this present darkness, against the spiritual hosts of wickedness in the heavenly places. Therefore take the whole armor of God, that you may be able to withstand in the evil day, and having done all, to stand. 

Commenting on this passage, the great evangelical Archbshop Marcus Loane (at whose hands I was confirmed 55 years ago when he was an Assistant Bishop in Sydney) wrote, 

There is a marked pause at the end of the long and salutary passage on home relationships; then Paul called on his scribe once more and the Letter was brought to a close with a call to arms. He knew that, just like the ancient Spartans, we were born for battle: therefore we must learn to ‘endure hardness’ as good soldiers of Christ (2 Timothy 2:3 Authorised Version). We have to live on ground where we will be under attack; it is like a camp in hostile country which must be held until the Captain returns in triumph. Attacks are launched against it by unseen adversaries, for the devil is in command of a vast host. He is always a most aggressive enemy, and that host is skilfully organised for war without quarter. No true soldier of Christ will be immune from its assaults, nor can he be neutral in that conflict. The battle field is overhung with clouds, and he will be forced to engage in hand-to-hand combat. But each member of that beleagured [sic] garrison can stand fast and prevail, because there are sources of strength available in Christ which can make them invincible.  Marcus L. Loane, Grace and the Gentiles (Edinburgh: Banner of Truth, 1981), 110.

Now, I know that some of our liberal friends smile condescendingly at that kind of teaching, but no less a teacher than Dr Eric Mascall reminded us in his Boyle Lectures that 

. . . it is part of traditional Christian belief that, behind and beyond the physical universe, there is a realm of purely spiritual beings, in whose affairs we have become implicated. I need hardly recall you to the tremendous and superb imagery in which the last book in the Bible . . . depicts the warfare in the unseen world between the angels of light and the powers of darkness. E.M. Mascall The Christian Universe (Darton, Longman & Todd, London 1966), p. 110

Scripture, tradition and Christian experience combine in assuring us that the struggle against evil with which Christians on earth are concerned can be seen in its true proportions only against the background of a vaster and more mysterious conflict in the unseen world in which they, too are caught up. When we are faced with the claim that Christians in a secular age ought to live as completely secularised men we can only reply that such a programme does no justice either to the true nature of this world or of existence as a whole . . . It ignores also the resources which we have at our command. (ibid. p. 129)

May the Lord open the eyes of all Christian people, not just to the cosmic struggle in which we have become involved, but also, as Mascall says, to the resources God has given us with which to overcome. 

He who dwells in the shelter of the Most High 

will abide in the shadow of the Almighty. 

I will say to the Lord, 

"My refuge and my fortress, my God, in whom I trust." 

For he will deliver you from the snare of the fowler 

and from the deadly pestilence. 

He will cover you with his pinions, 

and under his wings you will find refuge; 

his faithfulness is a shield and buckler. 

You will not fear the terror of the night, 

nor the arrow that flies by day, 

nor the pestilence that stalks in darkness, 

nor the destruction that wastes at noonday. 

A thousand may fall at your side, 

ten thousand at your right hand, 

but it will not come near you. 

You will only look with your eyes and see 

the recompense of the wicked. 

Because you have made the Lord your dwelling place 

- the Most High, who is my refuge- 

no evil shall be allowed to befall you, 

no plague come near your tent. 

For he will command his angels concerning you 

to guard you in all your ways. 

On their hands they will bear you up, 

lest you strike your foot against a stone. 

You will tread on the lion and the adder; 

the young lion and the serpent you will trample underfoot.

"Because he holds fast to me in love, I will deliver him; 

I will protect him, because he knows my name. 

When he calls to me, I will answer him; 

I will be with him in trouble; 

I will rescue him and honour him. 

With long life I will satisfy him and show him my salvation."

(Psalm 91)

Therefore with angels and archangels . . .

Today is known variously in the Church's calendar. For most Anglicans it is the solemnity of St Michael and All Angels; for Roman Catholics it is the solemnity of St Michael, St Gabriel and St Raphael, Archangels. The festival reminds us of the true nature of our worship, our way of living, and our warfare. Mainly because of the quotes from Eric Mascall, I share with you part of a talk I gave in 2001. 

The Catholic Christian has a devotion to the presence of Jesus in the Blessed Sacrament as well as a personal love of our Lady and the saints - those of our brothers and sisters in Christ who surround us in that great cloud of witnesses, cheering us on, supporting us with their love and prayers as we run the race that is set before us, looking to Jesus, the pioneer and perfecter of our faith (Hebrews 12:1-2) They are our brothers and sisters in glory, always part of the meeting of the Christian community for worship (remember . . . “Therefore with angels and archangels, and with all the company of heaven, we laud and magnify thy glorious name . . . “) as we are made part – even now – of the heavenly Mount Zion, the innumerable companies of angels, and the spirits of the just made perfect. (Hebrews 12:20-22)

St Paul speaks of Christians as those “upon whom the end of the ages have come.” (1 Corinthians 10:11). Furthermore, in the letter to the Hebrews, we are described as those who have (already) “tasted of the powers of the age to come.” (Hebrews 6:5) That’s why there can be found among us a dynamic sense of God’s presence, and an openness to both “ordinary” and “extraordinary” workings of his grace. In addition to our daily and weekly round of prayer, worship and service, we believe in times of spiritual refreshing - including the healing ministry and pilgrimage to shrines of Our Lady – in which we seek renewal and a deepening of our lives in Christ. 

Tied up with these things is the Biblical conviction that we are involved in a kind of “mopping up” operation in which Jesus’ decisive victory on Calvary is applied to the lives of people like us, and that from time to time this might even include the ministry of deliverance and exorcism. Now, I know that some of our liberal friends smile condescendingly at remarks like that, but no less a scholar than Dr Eric Mascall reminded us in his Boyle Lectures that 

“. . . it is part of traditional Christian belief that, behind and beyond the physical universe, there is a realm of purely spiritual beings, in whose affairs we have become implicated. I need hardly recall you to the tremendous and superb imagery in which the last book in the Bible . . . depicts the warfare in the unseen world between the angels of light and the powers of darkness.” (E.M. Mascall The Christian Universe Darton, Longman & Todd, London 1966, p. 110) 

Mascall later pointed out that 

“Scripture, tradition and Christian experience combine in assuring us that the struggle against evil with which Christians on earth are concerned can be seen in its true proportions only against the background of a vaster and more mysterious conflict in the unseen world in which they, too are caught up. When we are faced with the claim that Christians in a secular age ought to live as completely secularised men we can only reply that such a programme does no justice either to the true nature of this world or of existence as a whole . . . It ignores also the resources which we have at our command.” (The Christian Universe p. 129) 

At the beginning of St John’s Gospel, the Lord Jesus told Nathaniel that he would see heaven open, and the angels of God ascending and descending on the Son of Man (John 1:51). This is a powerful image. We know that Jesus is OUR Jacob’s ladder (Cf Genesis 28:12), and that in him heaven and earth are joined. As Anglican Catholics we are challenged to live and minister intentionally under that open heaven, entirely dependent on Jesus, who “works with us, confirming the Word with the signs that follow it”. (Mark 16:20)

St Bridget of Sweden (1303-1373) - on the Eucharist

St Bridget’s Eucharistic Vision, Italy, Naples Late 14th century

“One day, when a priest was celebrating Mass, 

I saw, at the moment of Consecration, 

how all the powers of heaven were set in motion. 

I heard, at the same time, a heavenly music, 

most harmonious, most sweet. 

Numberless Angels came down, 

the chant of whom 

no human understanding could conceive, 

nor the tongue of man describe. 

They surrounded and looked upon the priest,

 bowing towards him in reverential awe. 

The devils commenced to tremble, 

and took to flight 

in greatest confusion and terror.”