By DEB PIROCH
Born in Brusthem, Belgium, Christina Mirabilis (c. 1150-1224) was one of three sisters. “Mirabilis” means “Astonishing.” And according to her biography, the sisters decided to divide duties so that that the eldest would pray, the middle one care for the house, and the youngest, Christina, care for the sheep. The poor shepherdess died, however, or so they thought. She awoke in her coffin during her funeral Mass and floated to the top of the church for all to see. They all ran away except her sister and the priest. She came down only for Communion, having levitated to escape the smell of sin.
Christina had died. Today we might say she had suffered a seizure from epilepsy or some other cause, but her fellow men found no sign of life and she testified that she died, was shown Hell, Purgatory, and Heaven. And that in Heaven our Lord welcomed her but asked if she were willing to suffer that souls might be converted and more make it into Purgatory…for she had recognized faces she knew in both Hell and Purgatory. She willingly acquiesced and from that moment forth was restored to life.
She rejoined the Church Militant and with such fervor! To pray that less people of her generation would be damned and others not only saved but get to Heaven sooner. If you are ever asked why Catholics believe in Purgatory, which is “not in the Bible,” ask them meaning of 2 Macc. 12:46:
“It is therefore a wholesome and holy thought to pray for the dead, that they may be loosed from sins.” Many saints have had visions of Purgatory, and while we are not required to believe in the truth of these visions, Mother Church has always taught the reality of the Church Suffering, as well as the Church Militant and the Church Triumphant. Praying for the dead, or praying for souls in Purgatory, is part of our faith. When we pray for our dead family and friends, why not also pray for those our family remembered in their prayers? It is only a single generation and one may already be lost to memory. Christina seems to have understood just how much the Poor Souls suffer:
“As soon as I died, ministers of light, who are angels of God, received my spirit, and they led me to a dark and horrible place that was filled with the souls of men. The torments I saw in that place were so cruel and extreme that no tongue could suffice to describe them. And I saw there many departed whom I had known before in the flesh. Feeling great pity for these wretched souls I asked what place this was. I was thinking it was Hell. And my guides answered me: ‘This place is Purgatory.’ Then they led me to the torments of Hell and I recognized there too some of whom I had known when they were alive.”
No wonder Christina agreed to return to Earth and suffer for souls. Purgatory, we are taught, is actually a place of optimism. These souls suffer, but only because they are saved and not yet pure and holy enough to be united with God. In Hell there is no hope. Sadly, in our generation, no one speaks anymore of Hell. But that does not mean it has ceased to exist. Let us pray and offer up for those who suffer and those who deny Hell, deny sin, and deny God. These made Christina writhe in pain because of what faced them.
Already poor and orphaned, she embraced poverty to the point of sleeping on rocks, and wearing mismatched rags. She also began to suffering to a point that no one understood, in torturous anguish. Yet there were witnesses, like Jacques Cardinal de Vitry, who recorded that these horrible deeds — like throwing herself into fires — might cause her to shriek but in no way injured her body. So, if some may have regarded her as mad, others saw her as a saint. Homeless, she was twice briefly jailed but then a few years before death found a home at the Monastery of St. Catherine of Sint-Truiden.
What sufferings caused such consternation? She allowed herself to be attacked by dogs. She threw herself into fires. She would trample through thorn bushes, and throw herself under the mill’s water mill. That she suffered pain but never bodily harm was a testament, of course. She should have died many times over.
Thomas of Cantimpré, a student of St. Albert the Great, took time after her death to write a biography, while people still remembered her life and the miraculous events associated with it. Mystics Blessed Marie of Oignies and St. Lutgardis were among those influenced by her.
Certainly, she was bizarre, or a free spirit, or something in between. Because she would constantly smell sin around people, she would climb trees, hide in ovens, or levitate to escape the stench. Not surprisingly, she has become a patron saint for the mentally ill, psychiatrists, and psychologists.
An excerpt of her biography by St. Thomas of Cantimpré:
“When she wanted to pray she was compelled to retreat to the tops of trees or towers or other high places, so that isolated from others, she might find rest for her spirit….And she frequently stood erect atop fence posts, where she would chant the Psalms. It was clearly very painful for her at these times to touch the earth. Because of this and similar behavior, her sisters and friends were embarrassed not a little, because men though that she was full of demons.
“Full of demons she was not. She rejoiced in receiving our Lord in Holy Communion. She once dove into a holy water font to find peace. She urged the dying to Confession, and sought alms so that the sinful, by feeding her, might gain grace and salvation. She had the gift of prophecy and our Lord would let her know, for example, what souls merited Hell or Heaven when they were dying.
“She always walked about like one dying or in mourning, and a little wonder, since every day God revealed to her those who were dying merited either salvation or damnation. When someone died in the city who she knew through the spirit had been damned for his sin, she wept and writhed and contorted her body in every direction, and bent back her arms and fingers as if they were soft and boneless. Her pain was intolerable to all who saw her, and none was so unfeeling that he could behold it without the greatest contrition and compassion. But for those departing life who would be saved, she leapt about in so lively a dance that it was wondrous strange to see her in such merriment.”
Does the Devil dance when souls are saved? Hardly.
When in ecstasy she sang a song so sweet “it seemed more the song of angels than men.” She could understand Latin and the Scriptures, despite not being able to read a word. Yet she hesitated often to engage in matters of theology, preferring these be left to clergy, for whom she had sacred devotion, given their divine office.
She died most peacefully at the monastery. But in the year 1249, her biography alleges she appeared to a monk and stated that God wished her remains be put in a more prominent location. This was done, her bones placed next to the altar at the church and already the first miraculous healing occurred.
Was she an epileptic? Someone mentally ill? Who jumped in fires and turned like a top when she prayed? She could have been all of those things, and still a saint. He loves us all. And nothing is impossible with God. Nothing.
Her Feast is July 24.
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