Margaret of Cortona

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St. Margaret of Cortona. Painting by Jacopo Alessandro Calvi.

Margaret of Cortona (* 1247 in Laviano near Castiglione del Lago , Umbria ; † February 22, 1297 in Cortona ) was an Italian penitent and was a member of the Third Order of St. Francis of Assisi . She was canonized by the Catholic Church in 1728 .

Life

At the age of seven, Margareta lost her mother, who raised her piously. The father remarried, the relationship between the beautiful girl and the stepmother was and remained bad. At the age of 16 Margareta left her family and began to live with a nobleman without being married. She spent nine years of "sin and shame", as she later said, as the lover of a man for whom she was out of the question as a wife, but who enabled her to live a much more comfortable life than in her family. During this time she had a son.

When she was 25, she was dragged into the woods by her pooch. She found the nobleman, who had disappeared for days, murdered and already half decayed. That was the moment of her conversion : She found herself in a hopeless situation without her lover and tried first to return to her family. Her father wanted to take her in, but the stepmother didn't want to, got her way and Margareta was chased away.

She went to Cortona and tried to enter a monastery . But there her repentance was doubted, she was not accepted. Finally, in 1274, she was allowed to join the Third Order of St. Francis, where Friars Minor became her soul guides. She tortured her body in an effort to destroy her beauty, which she regarded as the source of all calamity. She publicly accused herself of her wrongdoing. She fled into solitude from the people whom she venerated like a saint for her penance . As a hermit there she had to endure strong temptations and fears on the one hand, and on the other hand she experienced mystical visions in which Christ assured her of his closeness. She venerated the pierced Heart of Jesus and his inner and outer sufferings. In her Sacred Heart Visions she received the revelation that every sin would wound the Lord anew, a topos that can also be found in Angela von Foligno and Margareta Maria Alacoque .

Margaretha maintained her rigorous life of penance, devoted herself self-sacrificingly to nursing the sick, and founded a hospital and an association of terziarinnen (female members of the Third Order) in Cortona . Margareta died on February 22nd, 1297 in Cortona, where she is still admired today.

On May 16, 1728 she was by Pope Benedict XIII. canonized; she is the patroness of the penitents and the city of Cortona. Her relics are in the sanctuary of the church of Santa Margherita , consecrated to her , in Cortona. Especially in the Baroque period she was often depicted: A woman in the habit of the Third Order with a cingulum and rosary , scourge and skull . There is also a small dog on many of the images. Her feast day is February 22nd, in some places May 16th.

literature

Web links

Commons : Margaret of Cortona  - Collection of Images, Videos and Audio Files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Biographical information from Schamoni, Wilhelm: The true face of the saints (see literature), [1] and Ekkart Sauser :  MARGARETA von Cortona. In: Biographisch-Bibliographisches Kirchenlexikon (BBKL). Volume 21, Bautz, Nordhausen 2003, ISBN 3-88309-110-3 , Sp. 901-902.  ( Article / beginning of article in Internet archive )
personal data
SURNAME Margaret of Cortona
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Religious, saint
DATE OF BIRTH 1247
PLACE OF BIRTH Laviano near Castiglione del Lago , Umbria
DATE OF DEATH February 22, 1297
Place of death Cortona