Angela Merici

Who they were

Angela Merici was born at Desenzano on Lake Garda on 21 March 1474. Evenings at home were spent listening to her father read the lives of the saints, and she grew devoted to St Ursula. Orphaned at fifteen, she lived with an uncle at Salò and became a Franciscan tertiary, then returned to Desenzano to works of mercy joined to prayer. In a vision her dead sister told her she would found a company of virgins.

Sent to Brescia in 1516, she saw the good that lay women could do in charity. On pilgrimage to the Holy Land in 1524 she suddenly went blind, seeing again only on her return while praying before a crucifix, and took it as God's gift so as to see the holy places with the eyes of the spirit. In 1535 she founded the Company of St Ursula, consecrated women living in the world rather than in cloisters, and died in 1540.

The miracles

The miracles examined for her causes are not described in the sources we have used.

Why that counted as sanctity

Angela opened a new way of consecrated life for women in the world, and led with a mother's gentleness: 'Do nothing by force, for God has given everyone free will and wants to compel no one, but only proposes and counsels.'

Connected on this site

• Zefirino Agostini Blessed
  “He established two religious congregations in his lifetime being the Pious Union of Sisters Devoted to Saint Angela Merici and the Ursuline Sisters of the Daughters of Mary Immaculate.” — Wikipedia
• Bianca Piccolomini Clementini Venerable
  “Bianca Piccolomini Clementini (1875 – 1959) was an Italian Roman Catholic nun and founder of the Company of Saint Angela Merici, the original name for the Ursuline order in Italy, in 1920.” — Wikipedia
• Pius VII Servant of God
  “She was canonized by Pope Pius VII in 1807.” — Wikipedia