In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and the Holy Spirit. Amen.
In her life we will be able to appreciate a great spirit of penance as a means of manifesting her
love for Jesus, knowing how to offer all her sufferings for the salvation of others.
Her entire life was filled with blessings from God. The ecstasies were continuous, the gift of
science was admired by the wisest theologians. Her Visions and prophecies stunned all who knew her.
Montefalco is a city in Italian Umbria which in Clare's time probably had about 2,000 inhabitants.
Previously it had been called Coccorone and it had been well walled for its defense.
At the beginning of the 13th century the neighborhood called Castellare
emerged outside the walls, which would grow a lot over the years.
For this reason in 1244 another wall was built to protect the population of Castellare
within a single walled perimeter. Starting in 1249 the whole complex began to be called Montefalco.
The city rises on a hill 1500 feet or 470 meters above sea level.
At the time of the saint the municipality of Montefalco enjoyed a wide autonomy.
It had its own statutes and a small army; it received tributes from merchants, mills and kilns.
It had its own administered civil and criminal justice. Politically it depended on the Holy See.
The spiritual atmosphere was good but a series of spiritual movements arose
that falsified the authentic faith and led to extravagances and serious errors.
One of these movements was that of the flagellants who promoted conversion with great penances.
They went through the cities bare-chested, beating their backs as if salvation depended
exclusively on doing penance and not on loving God and others. Other similar movements that
strongly emphasized penance and absolute poverty and that fell into heresy or serious excesses
were the fraticelli or Little Brethren, the humiliated or those of the spirit of freedom.
Clare's grandfather was named James. He was a very good business man and built a good family estate.
His three sons, Simón, Viviano and Damián maintained the union of their paternal assets for
a long time to avoid inconveniences. Damian, the youngest son, had been born between 1220 and 1225.
He married Jacoba Falcone. In 1251 they had Juana and in 1268 our Saint Clare.
In 1272 Francisco came to the world. It seems that his parents were devotees of Saint Francis
of Assisi and Saint Clare of Assisi who had died in 1226 and 1253 respectively, and whose fame had
spread throughout Italy. In 1273 Theodorica was born who died when she was very young.
When Saint Clare of Montefalco was less than six years old,
she sometimes went to visit her sister by herself. And when she was on the road,
she was presented with a demon with his face covered in the form of a woman, near the door
of a certain house and she was very frightened. But Clare had such a desire to go see her sister
that she kept on down the road and the demon would go back and enter the house.
Once she heard a voice telling her that he wanted to kill her like her sister Theodorica.
On another occasion the demon presented himself to her in the form of her sister Juana. She was
in her house, wanting to enter definitively the cell of her sister when she was six years old.
She thought she saw her sister, Juana, who told her: My Clare, for the love of God I must tell you
something that until now I have hidden from you. The whim you have to lock yourself up with me is
vain, foolish and reckless. It is in vain, because being no more than six years old, the Bishop of
Spoleto will never give you a license to enter. It is silly, because you think you find pleasure and
consolation in my cell and you are wrong. I assure you that in all this time I have been locked up, I
have had nothing but tribulations. It is reckless, because you do not know that if you enter, you
will have to fast every day and suffer everything that can be suffered. I confess to you my sister
that if it were not for the honor of the family, I would not want to be locked up any longer. Now I
have come to you secretly to give you this healthy advice that I have not been able to give you other
times. Then Saint Clare turned to the crucifix and prayed to know God's will. Suddenly, she
felt an internal voice telling her: "Go tomorrow to see your sister and you will know My will."
The next day, after Juana had listened attentively to Clare, Juana encouraged her to enter.
But if the devil manifested himself to her when she was such a little girl,
so did the baby Jesus and He filled her with happiness.
Saint Clare of Montefalco when she was a child while she was praying many times the
Virgin Mary appeared to her with the baby Jesus under her mantle. Jesus, advised by His mother,
approached Clare, took her by the hand and filled her with immense joy. Saint Clare who saw the baby
Jesus with her own eyes wanted to take Him and play with Him, but the baby Jesus escaped from
her by turning to His mother the Virgin Mary and leaving her with a great desire to love Him.
It is not surprising that she with so much love for Jesus wanted to dedicate her life to Him and
retire to live alone with her sister.
At the age of twenty, in 1271, Juana,
Saint Clare's older sister went to live with her friend Andrea in the cell built by her father
Damien who wanted the sanctity of his daughter on land that he had bought from Perone di Chiara.
This cell was in front of the hospital for the poor of the municipality called San Leonardo.
Saint Clare, being small, was allowed in when she went with her mother. Sometimes they stayed
to sleep there, especially when Juana was ill and her mother had to take care of her.
When Clare was five or six years old, she was already allowed to go alone.
She, despite the possible dangers, knew that her friend Jesus would defend her,
and when she was afraid, she made the sign of the cross to defend herself from the devil.
Just as Jesus granted her many gifts and visions, ecstasies and spiritual gifts,
He also allowed the devil himself to appear to Saint Clare
and make her suffer so that she would have the opportunity to show Him her love and
offer her sufferings for the salvation of her persecutors and of all sinners.
Saint Clare of Montefalco freed her sisters from the tricks of the demons,
so they were outraged. Frequently and, above all, on Friday nights they appeared to Saint
Clare around her and threatened to kill her because she radically destroyed their works.
One night the demons wanted to suffocate her. The nuns, who had heard noises, came and found Clare
very tired and helped her as best they could. And Saint Clare tried harder to defend them from
temptations, keeping them at the service of God. Clare herself told her confessor Father Tomás that
for seven years she had been exposed to the power of demons that had afflicted her with terrors,
blows, diseases and other sufferings. Saint Clare, to allow that the demons could more freely beat
her and were not impeded by her sisters, at night she would go out of the bedroom to her cloister.
Sister Marina affirms that once, while the sisters were in the oratory reciting the Divine Office,
Clare saw by revelation of the Holy Spirit a demon who had entered the oratory with her sisters.
The demon was with them during the Service and afterwards the demon went out with them.
Saint Clare said that the demon appeared in the form of a man
and that this was due to some gossip that had taken place between some sisters.
Her niece, Sister Juana, remembers that she often heard Clare's cry when the demons
appeared to her in her cell at night. Sometimes the demon appeared to her in the form of a man,
a woman or animals. Saint Clare told her that on occasion, the demons would put
their hands over her mouth to suffocate her and threatened her in different ways. One night,
this witness heard a sound as if someone was knocking on her lathe.
A sister wanted to go see who she was. But Saint Clare told her while this witness was present:
"Be careful where you go, because it is not who you think." And that sister went to the lathe and
found no one. And Clare told her: "All night I have seen a demon that was on the lathe."
Sister Marina declares that the year of her death Saint Clare saw a big devil with other little ones
who came to the monastery and wanted to enter but could not. And Clare saw them and they
tried to get in and they couldn't. Finally, they reached Clare's cell and the big demon told her:
"You have done this to me, but I will organize such intrigues against you and your sisters
that you will have much to suffer." And those demons went to another monastery in Montefalco.
And Clare said that in that convent many things were plotted against them and her convent.
The demons made her suffer. And she suffered, loved and grew more and more in
love and holiness, saving many souls for God.
Despite the fact that Clare was not educated,
she had a great capacity to understand the Sacred Scriptures. She understood the Sacred
Scriptures or the bible beyond the capacity of human understanding with such acuity that
of each thing, no matter how minimal, she made wonderful speeches with very deep expressions.
Her brother Francisco says in the process of beatification about Saint Clare: she had a very
clear understanding of all the virtues and vices. And she had it of all creatures so that from an
oak leaf she could say so many things, that if someone wrote them down, a mule could not carry
them. And to this witness, who asked her different questions of Sacred Scripture, Clare answered him
with such lucidity that everything was clarified better than in the writings and doctrines of
any other. And to an individual who asked Saint Clare about the meaning of the words of Scripture
in Exodus chapter 33 verse 23 that says: "you will see My back; but My face will not be seen."
Saint Clare of Montefalco replied that the back of God means divine and spiritual
things that are not seen but are believed and expected until everything is seen in glory.
Saint Clare answered deeply and truthfully the most difficult questions of theology
proposed to her by the great professors and expert theologians,
leaving them satisfied with her answers. Sister Marina declared before the judges
of the process of beatification that she remembered that among other great
theologians who came to ask saint Clare were Angelo of Rome, Bartolo de Spoleto,
Friar Santiago de Gonzio, Friar Pedro de Perusio, Don Pedro Colonna and others.
Sister Tomasa claims to have heard Clare say that if all the wise men from the university
of Paris came, she would know how to answer all their questions. God gave her so much
light that about a tree leaf she could say so many things as to write many books.
She also knew strange languages without having studied them.
Her niece Juana declares that one day Saint Clare told the nuns this witness being present:
We have a pilgrim from far away places nearby. When it was time for the pilgrim to come, Saint
Clare went to meet her at the door. And while she was going, she said to her sisters: "Come, come,
our pilgrim has already arrived." The pilgrim's name was Margarita and she was from Provence.
And Clare spoke with her about God and spiritual things, speaking in the language of the pilgrim.
And this witness heard Clare say that the pilgrim understood everything she had told her.
On the other hand, she knew the people who were coming to the monastery and their intentions,
as well as personal matters of their lives. Clare
also knew the hearts and intentions of the nuns in her convent.
Sister Marina says: One day two of the servants left the monastery to bring cherries by order
of Sister Clare, but they went to visit the sister of one of them who had just got married,
who showed them the wedding dresses and other worldly things. Upon returning to the convent,
Clare told them everything they had done and reprimanded them, ordering that those cherries
should not be eaten in the monastery. Another day, the same nuns went to the house of a relative of
this witness for bread, who invited them to drink something with her against the Prioress's mandate
and against the customs of the monastery. When they returned, Clare reprimanded them anyway.
A novice did an exaggerated penance, too hard on the body. Clare could not know without
divine revelation. Saint Clare called her out and secretly reprimanded her. The novice understood
that following and obeying her advice, she rejected the devil's temptations better with
a little penance than she did before. The novice herself had a secret sin that she had not revealed
even to the confessor. Clare discovered it and the novice repented and did penance.
When a sister had some temptation or thought against God, Clare herself called for her
and when the sister arrived, Saint Clare revealed what she thought and corrected the sister alone.
When they had a community meeting, Saint Clare told them: “I know what are the temptations and
thoughts that some have. I do not want to name them, but try to correct yourself."
A nun from the convent named Inés who said she had visions,
one day revealed one to Saint Clare, but she replied, this witness being present:
"That is not a divine vision but an illusion of the devil."
In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and the Holy Spirit. Amen.