Saint Angela Merici

Feastday: January 27

Click for a message from Saint Angela Merici

Can you imagine saying “no” to the Pope! Well that’s just what Angela Merici did when she felt the Pope did not understand her calling in the same way she did. Pope Clement VII wanted her to head up a group of nursing nuns. But, she wanted to work to educate the poor.

The exact date of her birth is not clear with historians, but most believe it was either in 1470 or 1474. She was born in Desenzano, Italy. Her father was a farmer. She had three older brothers, an older sister and younger sister. While she was still a young child, Angela’s brothers and older sister died. When she was a teenager, both of her parents died. Now alone, she and her younger sister went to live with an uncle in Salò, Italy.

People knew Angela really loved God. She spent a lot of her time praying. She was especially fascinated by Saint Ursula who was the daughter of a British Christian king in the tenth century. Several legends exist regarding Ursula, but Angela understood her to be someone executed for not marrying a pagan prince.

Angela Merici claimed to have several visions during her life and one of them was as a young girl. She saw the heavens open and angelic young girls came down from stairs. One of the angels was her sister who had died. They were all singing and playing musical instruments. The angel who was Angela’s sister told her that she was to organize a group of unmarried women and that the group would grow in numbers.

Angela belonged to the Third Order of Saint Francis which was an organization that allowed lay people to serve the Church. When she was 22 her uncle died and she returned to Desenzano. There she organized a type of support group for young, unmarried women where she prayed with the women and instructed them in religious matters.

A wealthy family in Brescia wanted her to open a school for young women in that city. While there, she went on a pilrgrimage to the Holy Land and, while no one ever knew exactly why or how, she became blind on that trip. She was not able to see any of the holy sights, but on the return trip, she regained her eyesight in the exact location where she had lost it.

This incident occurred around the time that Pope Clement VII asked her to head a community of women nurses. Angela told him no because she remembered the dream with her sister and thought God was calling her to something else. She wanted the group she would form to live among the people in the real world, in order to care for them and educate them, especially young and poor girls.

Soon after her conversations with the Pope, the French invaded Italy and there was much fighting, sickness, poverty, filthiness and squalor. Angela was distressed by the vast differences between the wealthy nobility and the poor people in the streets. Many lay people, priests, and monks came together to form hospitals and schools. Some people think that Angela might have been part of this effort. She lived a very simple life, but still kept company with nobility. She needed their wealth to help fund her enterprises.

It was on November 25, 1535 that she gathered a group of the women who were her friends and those who she had been teaching. Some of these women were wealthy widows. They moved into a house near the church St. Afra. They believed that they were under the protection of St. Ursula and called themselves Ursulines. At first, the community did not wear specific clothing and they lived with their own families. They gathered in the house to educate young girls, particularly the poor, in religious matters. The Ursulines divided the city into sections and gathered young women so that they might look after them and prevent others from hurting or taking advantage of them. They taught them in their school.

Since that time, almost 500 years ago, the Ursuline community can be found throughout the world teaching and caring for those who will hear the Good News.

Connecting to Faith First® Legacy Edition

Grade 3, chapter 18