Today is the feast day of Saint Clare of Assisi, “the sister moon to brother sun Francis,” who dedicated her life to serving the most in need. I share the beautiful story of this saint below, along with the aforementioned quote:

HISTORY OF SAINT CLARE

The 12th century, Assisi, Italy. Clare Favarone was born, daughter of Hortolana and Favarone, a family considered noble in local society. The most precise date of her birth is believed to be 1194 (although some historians point to 1193), in the midst of the Middle Ages, marked by the collapse of the feudal system and the growth of commerce.

As the firstborn, it was natural for her mother Hortolana to fear the pregnancy and, especially, childbirth. Extremely religious, she always prayed for a good delivery, when one day, she heard a voice telling her: “Do not fear, woman, for you will have a normal delivery and the light of the one who is to be born will shine with more clarity than a sunny day.” For this reason, she named her Clare at baptism.

The girl Clare grew up in an environment of nobility and abundance, for according to biographer Thomas of Celano, her father was a military man and the family, on both sides, consisted of knights. Her father, Favarone, son of Ofreduccio and grandson of Bernardino, lived with his brothers in a beautiful and grand house, which the family had owned next to the Cathedral of Assisi for more than fifty years, although they were also rural landowners with castles in the vicinity. But Clare also had the support of faith. Her mother took care to educate her for even nobler actions, especially practicing piety and charity towards the most needy.

It is Celano who states: “She gladly extended her hand to the poor and, from the abundance of her house, supplied the needs of many.” In this period of the Middle Ages, money was becoming a new king. The poor and the sick, those who could not rise on the social ladder, were marginalized. Celano clearly remembers that, even living in an environment of wealth and ostentation, Clare understood that worldly appearances and adornments could be deceptive. “She came to understand that the things of the earth, however beautiful they might be, could not hold her heart.”

It is worth remembering that chivalric culture was the first of the Middle Ages to be developed by lay people and not by clerics, and it proposed how women should be educated to be pleasant, discreet, pious, becoming gentle wives and mothers. They had, in short, to care for their good reputation, and noblewomen led quite reclusive lives, while others participated in their husbands’ businesses, in the daily struggle to support the family and to build the civilization of the city.

The girl Clare, even living in an environment of wealth and ostentation, gradually cultivated a pious and simple life, a characteristic that would later become evident as a woman consecrated to God.

When she was close to turning 18, her parents began to think about her marriage. Clare did not agree with the idea of marrying so young and was always postponing the decision. In reality, she was beginning to be interested in the life project of a young man from Assisi: Francis. Thomas of Celano explains it this way: “When she heard of the then famous Francis who, as a new man, renewed with new virtues the path of perfection, so obscured in the world, she immediately wished to see him and hear him, moved by the Father of spirits, from whom, though in a different way, they had received the first impulses.”

Clare was always well-informed about Francis’s steps in Assisi, because Friar Rufino and Friar Silvester were her relatives. Not infrequently, she listened to Francis’s sermons, who usually spoke in the Church of Saint Rufinus or the Cathedral of Saint George.

Francis’s preaching was impressive because it was different from “sermons.” In his words and in his manner of being, there was something new. It was certainly the power of the Gospel that shone through. Francis presented himself dressed with great simplicity, without pomp or ostentation. His words were inflamed with love for God. Clare learned that the brothers’ life was extremely poor.

According to Celano, Francis visited her, and she visited him even more often, moderating the frequency of their meetings to prevent that divine quest from being noticed by people and misinterpreted by rumors.

“The young woman left home with only one companion and attended secret meetings with the man of God. His words seemed to flame, and she considered his actions superhuman.” Clare’s companion in her meetings with Francis was Bona de Guelfúcio, a witness in her Process and sister of Pacífica de Guelfúcio, one of the first nuns of San Damiano. Already at 18, Clare was aware that she would not be understood by her parents when she took this decisive step. She had confided to Francis how she wished to fulfill her vocation, and he would guide her to carry out God’s designs. “Then she completely submitted to Francis’s counsel, taking him as the guide of her path, after God. Therefore, her soul hung on his holy exhortations, and she welcomed everything he taught her about the good Jesus into a warm heart. She already found it difficult to bear the elegance of worldly ornaments, and despised as rubbish all that is applauded outside, so that she might gain Christ,” her biographer adds.

In a short time, Clare arrived at the Porziuncola. Francis welcomed her and gave her a warm greeting. Moved, she entered the church, knelt before the altar, and for a few moments, remained in prayer. Then, she rose with determination; she took off her shoes, shed her brocade dress and exchanged it for a coarse tunic, removed her rich belt and replaced it with a rough rope.

Then, she knelt again; she let go of her hair at once, which slipped over her shoulders; then, she remained with her head bowed, awaiting the last sacrifice.

Francis gently gathered her blonde hair and, very slowly, cut it. The ceremony was over.

The Relatives’ Reaction

As was to be expected, Clare’s relatives’ reaction was swift. In the morning, as soon as they discovered her escape, they went on a war footing and quickly arrived at the monastery of Saint Paul to take her back home. They threatened to break down the door. They wanted Clare, dead or alive. With their outward display and threats, they hoped to scare her, but they were deluded! Clare was immovable. Since every threat was in vain, they resorted to good manners, flattery, and promises; they appealed to feelings, to the pain of her mother, sisters, and the whole family, but Clare was unyielding; she knew she was safer within those walls than if she were in a castle.

She Clings to the Altar

When she realized that they were about to lose control and resort to violence, Clare, with one gesture, shattered all their illusions: she fled to the church and ran to the altar; with one hand she held the cloth and with the other she removed the veil from her head, revealing herself without the hair that had been cut. Thus, she showed that she was now consecrated to God and that no one could touch her. Faced with such firmness, her family had no choice but to leave the church and the monastery, confused.

Transferred to the Monastery of Santo Ângelo

In Saint Paul, Clare could only remain for a few days. Perhaps it was the nuns themselves who requested her departure after the confusion caused by her presence. Francis arranged for her transfer. Once again, he went to the Benedictine Fathers and obtained Clare’s transfer to the monastery of Santo Ângelo di Panzo.

Finally, A Little Peace!

In the quietness and silence of the monastery of Santo Ângelo, Clare was able to reinvigorate her ideal of life. She carefully adhered to the prescriptions of the Rule of Saint Benedict, which has as its foundation: “Ora et Labora” (Pray and Work)! With this, Clare certainly did not intend to embrace the Rule of Saint Benedict. Her flight to the Porziuncola during the night, her total abandonment to God beyond any structure, following Francis’s example, would have made no sense. In the monastery of Santo Ângelo, Clare lived for a few weeks. These were days of indescribable serenity and joy for her.

Clare’s joy lay entirely in feeling loved and protected by the Lord, with the same love with which a mother protects her little daughter. Fleeing home had closed the world behind her to open a threshold to the mystery of God. Her life had now transformed into a rainbow of prayer and contemplation: a joyful and childlike thanksgiving. She had fled home on a spring night to embrace the ideal of total poverty, and she had found true freedom, perfect joy. She had achieved her dream.

She Meets Her Sister Agnes

Clare felt the need to express her ardent mystical experience. Almost daily, her sister Agnes would visit her: she was a very beautiful young woman, only fifteen years old, with great sensitivity to the supernatural. After Clare’s escape, her family had placed their hope in her.

“Dearest Agnes,” her sister confided to her, “remember: it is better to live one day in the house of the Lord than a thousand days outside it. Youth is a passing wind. Beauty vanishes like smoke. Life ends and nothing remains here.” Clare and Agnes, who believed themselves to be bearers of a new Order, certainly could not remain in Santo Angelo di Panzo.

Francis obtained for them the small convent annexed to San Damiano, along with the little church where they had gone to pray so many times.

San Damiano thus became a cenacle of women passionately devoted to the Lord, a seed destined to germinate a line of beautiful souls, uncompromising followers of the teachings of the Poverello.

After all, Francis had predicted it, as Clare recounts in her testament: “Having climbed the wall of the said church, he then cried out with a loud voice and in the French language: ‘Come and help me in this work of the monastery of San Damiano, because very soon women will come to live in it, and by their fame and the holiness of their lives, glory will be given to our heavenly Father throughout His Holy Church.'”

Clare and Agnes were not alone for long, because many young women from Assisi were attracted by their example.

From these first companions, we have, besides their names, also documentation that testifies to the holiness of their lives and their unwavering fidelity in following Clare’s example.

Shortly after entering San Damiano, a childhood friend of Clare’s, Pacífica, asked to join the Offreducci sisters; and from Perugia came Benvenuta, known from the years of their escape from Assisi, along with her whole family. Then Balvina de Martino joined; the following year, Filipa, daughter of Leonardo de Gisleno.

All promised obedience to Saint Francis, who would not fail to follow the small community with extreme diligence and with the love that the most beautiful flower of the spiritual garden deserved.

For the sisters, who began to be called “Damianites,” after proving their courage, Clare herself prescribed, with evangelical simplicity, a rule to be observed. In 1215, she had petitioned the Apostolic See for the approval of the Privilege of Poverty, a unique document, with which the Saint wished, approved by the Pope, for herself and her followers, the choice not to accept any possessions.

And, in the Sealed Rule, approved by the way of life of the new community, it is written: “The blessed father, considering that we feared no poverty, toil, tribulation, humiliation, and no contempt of the world, that, rather, we held them in great delight, moved by paternal affection, wrote for us the form of life in this way:

“‘As, by divine inspiration, you have made yourselves daughters and servants of the Most High Supreme King, the heavenly Father, and have espoused the Holy Spirit, choosing to live according to the perfection of the Holy Gospel, I wish and promise, on my part and by my friars, always to have of you and them attentive care and special solicitude.’ Which he, with all fidelity, fulfilled while he lived and wished that it always be fulfilled by the friars.”

After three years of monastic life, Francis deemed it appropriate to give the community of San Damiano an outline of organization: he thought of appointing an abbess. This could be no other than Clare, the firstborn of the Order.

But Clare refused: “No, not me, Francis! I fled from all honors and the vanity of the world; I cannot place myself in command of my sisters. I only want to serve and obey!” “Well!” — Francis said in response — “if you want to obey, then I ask you to do so out of obedience!”

Eager for the Word of God

Clare, as soon as she was elected abbess, felt the need for sure help: she feared, above all, not following the path of perfect poverty. For this reason, she would have wished to meet more often with Francis. But the “Poverello” was often far from Assisi and avoided going frequently to San Damiano so as not to arouse “admiration and suspicion” among people.

He had recommended to his friars not to have too much “familiarity” with the nuns and not to enter their monasteries. And in this, he wanted to be the example. In San Damiano, Clare finally found herself at ease.

Crossing those ruined walls, she understood that she had arrived where God, for so long, had been leading her. The bareness of the walls, the desolation of the places, the unplastered walls, the rustic, un-squared wooden boards of the so-called “little choir,” the steep and disjointed staircase leading to the dormitory, a large, bare, and cold room—all told her this.

Without a doubt, it was the poorest convent ever seen: the true citadel of Holy Poverty.

Francis had predicted to Clare that other ladies would follow her and embrace her ideal of life. After Agnes, the first to rush to San Damiano was Pacífica de Guelfuceio, the one who helped her in her nocturnal escape.

Then came Benvinda de Perusa, her dearest friend. Next joined Balvina de Offreduccio, Cecilia de Gualtiero, Angelúcia de Angeleio, Filipa de Ghislerio, Francisca de messer Capitâneo, Amata de Martino, and many others. Beatriz, Clare’s younger sister, and her mother Hortolana completed the group.

Thus was born, in San Damiano, the second Franciscan Order, the feminine branch, which Francis liked to call the “Poor Ladies.”

An Oasis of Peace

In a short time, the community of San Damiano became an authentic oasis of peace, where everything was warmth and intimacy.

The very desolation of the place, of the walls, of the utensils, transmitted serenity and joy. No lament rose from San Damiano: the poverty of the house, discomforts, the beds, the cold, hunger, did not torment. The Sisters, the poorer they were, the happier they felt.

Clare, every corner of the convent was a corner of paradise, full of warmth and intimacy: a perennial invitation to feast, to joy.

The Poorest in the World

Nothing was their property, but everything was accepted as a loan; they considered themselves “pilgrims and strangers in this world.” They walked barefoot in all seasons, with coarse garments and a rope around their waists, their heads shaved and covered with a white and black cloth.

Their food was “moderate and austere”; they had proposed to “fast throughout the year.” For a bed, they had a mat spread on the bare floor, and for a pillow, a piece of wood. The dormitory was a large, cold, and miserable room, where poor cots were lined up against the wall.

According to Thomas of Celano, Clare was very ill after forty years of living in extreme poverty. “The vigor of her body, chastised in the early years by the austerity of penance, was finally overcome by a hard illness, to enrich her, sick, with the merit of her works. Virtue is perfected in infirmity,” says the biographer.

When her illness began to worsen, Clare received a visit from the Cardinal of Ostia, patron and protector of the Franciscan family. This was Cardinal Reinaldo de Segni, who would later become Pope Alexander IV. It was he who obtained from the Pope the confirmation of the Privilege of Poverty.

Knowing of Clare’s condition, Pope Innocent IV, who had resided with the Curia in Perugia from 1251 to 1253, immediately went to visit the servant of Christ with the cardinals, as the Legend recounts: “He entered the monastery, went to her bed, brought his hand to the sick woman’s mouth for her to kiss. She took it gratefully and asked with greater reverence to kiss the Apostolic’s foot. Then she asked with an angelic face to the Supreme Pontiff for the remission of all her sins. He exclaimed: ‘Oh, if only I needed so little forgiveness!'” Sister Agnes came from Monticelli, where she was abbess, to visit Sister Clare. Seeing her condition, she cried profusely. And she was comforted by her sister: “Dearest sister, it pleases God that I depart; but you, stop weeping, for you will come to the Lord soon after me, and He will grant you great consolation before I depart from you.” In reality, Agnes died shortly after.

Thomas of Celano reports that at the end she seemed to struggle in agony for many days, during which the faith of the people and their devotion grew. She was also daily honored as a true saint by frequent visits from cardinals and prelates. What is admirable is that, being unable to take any food for seventeen days, the Lord invigorated her with such strength that she comforted all who visited her in the service of Christ.

At Clare’s bedside, the presence of the friars: Friar Juniper, Friar Angelo, and Friar Leo.

The biographer says that, at the moment of her departure, Clare conversed with her soul in these terms: “Go safely, because you have a good traveling companion. Go, because He who created you, also sanctified you, and taking care of you, as a mother takes care of her child, loved you with tender love. Lord, blessed be You for having created me.”

The agony lasted an entire night. On the morning of August 11, 1253, Clare entered into glory and went to meet the Beloved Spouse of her soul. At the gates of paradise, she would be received by Father Francis.

Extracted from: http://www.ofmsantoantonio.org/historiaSantos/santaClara.html