Subj : =?UTF-8?Q?March_24th_=E2=80=93_St=2E_Catherine_of_Vadstena=2C_Bridgetti To : All From : rich Date : Tue Mar 23 2021 10:14:45 From: rich March 24th =E2=80=93 St. Catherine of Vadstena, Bridgettine =C2 (Also known as Catherine of Sweden) Born at Ulfasa, Sweden, in 1331; died March 24, 1381; cultus approved in 1484 by Pope Innocent VIII. Fourth of the 8 children of Saint Bridget and her husband, Ulf Gudmarsson of Nierck, Saint Catherine was sent to Risberg Convent to be educated at a very young age. She wished to remain in the convent to pursue a religious vocation, but she was married at age 13 or 14 to Eggard (Edgard) Lydersson von K=C3=BCrnen, a lifelong invalid and long-suffering man. She and Eggard took a vow to remain celibate and she tended to him with great devotion. He allowed her to do anything she pleased under the direction of the Church. Catherine grew extremely sad when her father died and Saint Bridget went to live in Rome. For a time (as she herself told Saint Catherine of Siena), she never smiled. In 1349, Eggard permitted Catherine to travel to Rome to visit her mother during the Jubilee of 1350. While in Rome she learned of her husband's death, which Saint Bridget had prophesied. (Farmer says that she returned to Sweden and nursed her husband until his death.) Even then she was for some time extremely unhappy, because Rome in the 14th century was a dissolute place and her mother would not let her go out. From the time of her husband's death, she lived the life of devotion that she had desired, refusing persistent suitors who wished to marry the beautiful young widow. Some of them even lay in wait for her to carry her off. One was distracted when a hart ran by just as Bridget and Catherine passed. Others, it is said, were blinded. To try to repulse such suitors, and also as an act of humility, Catherine always went about in the most ragged and threadbare clothing. Soon Catherine was her mother's devoted, reliable, and constant assistant, and served her for the next 25 years. In 1372, she and her mother made a pilgrimage to the Holy Land, returning by way of Rome, where Saint Bridget died the following year. Catherine returned with her mother's body to Sweden and there she became abbess of the convent of Vadstena, founded by her mother, and the motherhouse of the Bridgettine (Salvatorian) Order. Now followed intense work to promote the Bridgettine Order. Bound together in double monasteries, men and women pledged themselves to live in poverty, save for the right to buy as many books as they needed for study and devotion In 1375, she returned to Rome to win papal approval for the order. She succeeded in getting Urban VI's approval but failed in bringing about the canonization of her mother. She died soon after her return from Rome. Her vita was written by Ulpho, a Brigittine friar, thirty years after her death (Attwater, Attwater2, Benedictines, Bentley, Delaney, Encyclopedia, Husenbeth, White). Saint Catherine's patronage is invoked as protection against abortion, perhaps because of the chastity of her life (White). Reflection. Whoever has to dwell in the world stands in need of great prudence; the Holy Scripture itself assures us that =E2=80=9Cthe knowledge of the sai= nts is prudence.=E2=80=9D (Prov. 9:10) Bible Quote: For as the body is one and hath many members; and all the members of the body, whereas they are many, yet are one body: So also is Christ. For in one Spirit were we all baptized into one body, whether Jews or Gentiles, whether bond or free: and in one Spirit we have all been made to drink.=C2 [1 Co 12:12-13 ] <><><><> Love is strong as death: =C2 =C2 Fasten this sign of the Crucified upon your breast and your h= eart, fasten it upon your arm, so that in all your actions you may be dead to sin. Do not be dismayed by the hardness of the nails; it is no more than the severity of love. Do not complain of their unbreakable firmness; love also is strong as death. It is love that puts to death all our sins and failings, love that deals their death blow. In a word, by loving the Lord's commandments we die to sin and to deeds of shame. God is love; his word is love, that word which is all-powerful, sharper than a two-edged sword, penetrating to the point where soul is divided from spirit or joints from marrow. Our soul and our flesh must be transfixed by the nails of love, and then we ourselves can say: I am wounded by love. Love has its own nail and its own sword with which to pierce the human soul; happy are they who are wounded by them. =C2 =C2 Let us willingly expose ourselves to these wounds; if we succ= umb to them, we shall not taste everlasting death. Let us take up our Lord's cross, the cross on which our unregenerate selves must be crucified and sin destroyed. --St. Ambrose of Milan --- NewsGate v1.0 gamma 2 * Origin: News Gate @ Net396 -Huntsville, AL - USA (1:396/4) .