O Lord, let St. Angela never cease commending us to Your kindness. By always imitating her charity and prudence may we succeed in keeping Your teachings and reflecting them in our lives.
Feastday: January 27
Optional Memorial of St. Angela Merici, virgin
St. Angela Merici, foundress of Ursuline Sisters
Old Calendar: St. John Chrysostom, bishop, confessor and doctor
- St. Angela Merici was born in the small Italian town of Desenzano on the shore of Lake Garda in 1474. Tradition tells us that Angela came from a middle-class farming family. The Merici family was very close and openly practiced their faith. Giovanni Merici read to his children tales of the great saints of the Church and at a young age (by her own account, 5 d a great opportunity to serve when he asked her to take charge of a religious order of nursing sisters. But Angela knew that nursing was not what God had called her to do with her life.
She had just returned from a trip to the Holy Land. On the way there she had fallen ill and become blind. Nevertheless, she insisted on continuing her pilgrimage and toured the holy sites with the devotion of her heart rather than her eyes. On the way back she had recovered her sight. But this must have been a reminder to her not to shut her eyes to the needs she saw around her, not to shut her heart to God's call.
All around her hometown she saw poor girls with no education and no hope. In the fifteenth and sixteenth century that Angela lived in, education for women was for the rich or for nuns. Angela herself had learned everything on her own. Her parents had died when she was ten and she had gone to live with an uncle. She was deeply disturbed when her sister died without receiving the sacraments. A vision reassured anted to meet her and visited her in Cremona. When she returned to Brescia she continued to be a guest of Gallo, then she moved first to San Barnaba and finally to a house near the church of Saint Afra.On the 25th November 1535, on Saint Catherine’s day, she established the "Saint Ursula Society": the first 28 members consecrated themselves to God, following in the steps of Angela.
Angela died on the 27th January 1540 and was buried in the ancient church of Saint Afra (now Saint Angela’s sanctuary) in Brescia, where she still rests. She was beatified by the Church in 1768 and proclaimed "Saint" in 1807.
In 1962 St. Angela Merici was proclaimed the principal patron coordsize="21600,21600" o:spt="75" o:preferrelative="t" path="m@4@5l@4@11@9@11@9@5xe" filled="f" stroked="f">
While Angela was in Brescia, women who neither became nuns nor married, often because they had no dowry, had no social recognition. Angela saw that these women, especially poor girls, were reduced to servile conditions. She established the "Society of St. Ursula" and gave some dignity to these women, who were able to freely decide to consecrate themselves to God in the world, without needing a dowry and without leaving their home environment. Her "daughters" all lived in their families but they met up now and again and were helped by a few widows of the Brescia nobility, chosen by Angela to look over the new institution. A new state of life was born with the Society; that of the Virgins consecrated in the world. Angela established a Rule for them and dictated the Memoirs and the Testament, which has a collection of h 13.5pt">Facts and social sense of Saint Angela
In a time when seclusion was promoted for women, Angela considered life consecrated to God not as one enclosed within the walls of a cloister, but rather as a life immersed in the social web so that there would be more direct contact with the world’s material and spiritual needs. Her "daughters" would continue to live in their respective families and in their work environment, and would spread their vocation in their daily lives. Theirs was an authentic testimony to Christian life: they had to give a good example in their environment and try and bring peace and harmony (see Memoirs 5).
Saint Angela’s social sense led her to turn to all those people that needed her help. Even Duke Francesco Sforza wanted to meet her and be comforted by her when he passed through Brescia and he was to ask her to consider him 13.5pt">The Society established by Saint Angela, today
Very soon after Angela’s death, her "daughters" started working in the Sunday schools of Christian doctrine where later reading and writing were also taught. While in Italy various Bishops started instituting Saint Ursuline Societies, in France in particular these were transformed into religious communities, which then spread to all the continents. Their aim was to educate women and they provided teachers and external free schools. Many other congregations of religious Ursulines were created in the following centuries that always considered Angela as their Mother.
In 1810 Napoleon suppressed religious orders. If the Society continued to live on in devout 13.5pt">Saint Angela: the gift of the teacher
Iconography has often represented Angela surrounded by young girls and attributed to her that work which her followers carried out; they had actually learnt this art from the writings left by Angela herself. Her writings "The Testament" and "Memoirs" in fact can be referred to young people to be educated because in them a splendid formation programme can be discovered. Here are – in practise – some of the upholding structures of pedagogy, which comes from Angela Merici’s intuitions.
- In order to educate, first of all one has to respond to the more urgent material needs since it is not possible to preach sublime truths to those who lack even the necessities.
- Angela recommends that Angela's time. Churches, chapels, stories and paintings all bore witness to the popularity of the saint. It would never have occurred to her to give the company her own name, and the legend of Ursula and her companions probably most aptly characterized Angela's view of the lives and works of those who would join together under the "banner of St. Ursula".
Angela created a community of women which was fundamentally different from other Orders existing then, such as the Benedictines and the Poor Clares. Her rule combined open-mindedness and religious commitment in a way which had not been possible for women until that time. Angela knew from experience that women could give themselves to service within the larger community without the protection of the habit or the cloister, living celibate lives in a society in which many factors militated strongly against such a choice. Angela's spirituality was based on her w.newadvent.org/cathen/05277a.htm"> ecstasy , she had a vision in which it was revealed to her that she was to found an association of virgins who were to devote their lives to the religious training of young girls. The
Angela Merici is known now as the foundress of the Ursuline nuns- and so she was, but despite her own inclinations. In reality she was in advance of her own times. Her plan of religious women without distinctive habit, without solemn vows and enclosure, was directly contrary to prevailing notions at her period, and under the influence of St. Charles Borromeo at Milan and subsequent papal legislation (under St. Pius V) the Ursulines were obliged to adopt the canonical safeguards then required of all nuns.
In our times, many orders of sisters have engaged in teaching. Before 1535, however, there was no religious order engaged in educational work. Nuns there were aplenty; but their role was seen as c ass="MsoNormal"> There was no doubt in her mind that the Lord would take care of the mission she had begun.
And so he did.
The Ursuline Sisters have spread to many countries.
The order continues its works for Jesus and his Church, especially in the education of children and young adults.
Angela was proclaimed a saint by Pope Pius VI in 1807.
Angela Merici reminds us that our own struggles and disappointments can help us see the hurts of others.
When we are willing to reach out, the Lord will use us to do his wonderful work. Let us ask St. Angela to show us how to be sensitive and compassionate.
Our Founder, Saint Angela Merici
Angela Merici, daughter of a pious, middle class farm family, was born in Desenzano, Italy, around 1474. Angela's time was a time of contradiction; a time of violence and a time of compassion; a time of poverty and a time of wealth. Angela, product of that time, continually allowed the Holy Spirit to transform her life. Living most of her life in Brescia, a city in northern Italy, Angela became well known for her ministry of service to the marginalized: the displaced, the poor, the orphaned, the sick.
After Angela's death on January 27, 1540, the Company of Saint Ursula spread rapidly. Ursuline communities were established quickly in France, Germany, Belgium, Holland, Switzerland, Canada and the United States. Today, thousands of Ursuline Sisters work to proclaim the Good News of Jesus Christ on six continents.
Angela: Woman of Prayer
Light a candle, sit quietly, and pray with Angela:
< font-family:Calibri">The Company of St. Ursula, also commonly known as the Company of St. Angela, was founded by Angela Merici on November 25, 1535, in Brescia. It grew rapidly all over the town, and the increasing number of members had to be organised in groups, each within a parish. The Company then spread throughout the whole Diocese of Brescia, and eventually involved several other Italian Dioceses, and also some foreign ones.
In 1810, the Company was abolished by Napoleon's laws, but it was re?established in 1866 by Bishop Girolamo Verzeri and two sisters, Elisabetta and Maddalena Girelli.The Company’s special spiritual gift, or charism , is well defined in the words of Angela herself in the Prologue to the Rule. Her Daughters were “...chosen to be true and virgi
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