Catholic Heroes… St. Colette Of Corbie

By DEB PIROCH

Her birth was a miracle, her mother not unlike John the Baptist’s mother, for St. Colette was conceived and born when her mother was age 60. Named Nicolette Boelle, this was shortened to “Colette” in everyday speech, Corbie being the name of the area where she lived in France. Her father, Robert, was a carpenter, who worked at the town’s Benedictine Abbey. Her mother was named Marguerite. Both were gone by the time Colette was about 18 years of age. The exact age she was when they died is not known, but her father left her care to the local priest till of age.
Her family and environs were likely holy, and these found fertile ground in Colette, for as soon as she was able, she became a Third Order Franciscan and an Anchorite. By age 20 she had chosen to be walled up for life in a small room next to the church, where she would live, pray, and give her life to God. She could see the Blessed Sacrament, hear Mass, and receive the sacraments from there.
From a younger age she had always sought out God actively and so others sought her out, asking for her advice. She had also given to the poor, including lepers. Because so many came to speak to her through the grille, her hours had to be limited by her superior. Then, after four years, she had a vision.
She dreamt of St. Francis, who was asking her to help reform the Franciscan order and strive for a stricter rule, more austere poverty.
It’s hardly surprising that she hesitated and ignored the dream at first, but she was struck blind and, some say, mute. When she acquiesced to the request, she regained both. She came out and was allowed to become a Poor Clare. She required a dispensation to change her status. So first she and her confessor visited the Antipope Benedict XIII of Avignon, who was recognized in France as the true pope. This was the time of the Great Schism. He made her the head of all the Poor Clares.
Colettine nuns are now located throughout the world, but this was certainly not the case at the time. Near the end of her life there were as many as 18 convents (this number varies depending on which account one reads). As she began her work in earnest, because of the laxity that was in fashion, her reforms led to great opposition and viciousness.
But indeed, she asked nothing of the nuns that she herself did not also do. Her habit was a patchwork of bits of fabric mottled together with thread and needle. That she required all religious houses rely on divine Providence for sustenance worried some townspeople, concerned they would be burdened in caring for the religious. All nuns went barefoot and perpetually fasted and abstained. In the beginning, she met with little success in the dioceses of Paris, Beauvais, Noyon and Amiens. But all is really the fruit of prayer, sacrifice, and God’s will. Eventually France, Flanders, and Spain started to take root.
Before we look to what she achieved, what was she like? This is always a challenge trying to portray the life of someone from over five hundred years ago. Very little writing was left behind. We know she was especially devoted to the Cross and, indeed, had a true relic with her. Fridays were especially sacred to her, and she spent the entire day every week honoring Our Lord’s Passion in prayer.
From one of her first biographies, we learn that her mother, as well, was particularly devoted to honoring the Passion. (In that her mother outlived her father, her piety no doubt influenced her daughter the more greatly.) Receiving Holy Communion was enough to transport her to into ecstasy for hours afterward.
Like St. Francis, she was additionally known to have an affinity for animals, whom she loved. One lamb would often follow her into the church when she prayed. One cannot ignore the symbolism, obviously, of her companion to the Lamb of God.
Some things never change! Her devout life, trials aside, were not pleasing to the Evil One, and devils would physically assault her. They would appear to her as ugly insects (because they knew she detested ants), as decaying bodies and also strike her, causing her pain and leaving marks. Others were sometimes witness to these events.
When she protested they answered: “Cease then, your prayers. . . . For you torment us more by your prayers than we do you.” One account states the devils began to intimidate and frighten her even when she was a very young anchorite. We should also mention that one of her main prayer intentions was praying for the Church and its leaders. Would we had a hundred St. Colettes!
Miracles were associated with her saintliness, and she is known particularly as an intercessor for those trying to conceive, or having difficult pregnancies. In one case a baby was stillborn and the parent, in such distress, insisted the priest baptize the child. He could not, so the parent in grief took the baby to Colette. She wrapped the baby in her nun’s veil and he lived. This was not the only case where she saved one from death.
In another instance she came upon a family and the woman was in childbirth. The mother was sick, and nothing was progressing. The husband begged for help. Colette went straight to a chapel, and prostrate, prayed until a healthy baby was born. Colette had occasion to heal other sick from disease, including leprosy, and prophesied the death of herself and a dear friend, who was St. Vincent Ferrer.
From the time she became an anchorite, Blessed Henry de Beaume, priest and theologian, was her confessor, and he had testified to the truth of her vision, dying years later in 1439. Though not officially beatified by the Vatican, he is honored with the title of “blessed” by the Franciscans. One of her first biographers was a later confessor.
When her death was near, she was in Ghent, where she passed away. She had received the sacraments and died in the odor of sanctity. Later her relics were moved to lie in Poligny, in eastern France, at the site of one of her convents. However, her body had to be hidden during the time of the French Revolution, until it was safe to put them out for veneration again. This happened in time for her canonization in 1807.
At the moment of her death, she appeared simultaneously to several of her sisters at different locations: The date she passed, March 5, is her feast day. This year the feast is abrogated as it falls on the first Sunday of Lent.
Perhaps this is a Lenten intention? Whether virgin, mother, religious, or widow, let us ask her and the Blessed Virgin to intercede for us, and live our state in life the best we can, for Christ’s Mother knew them all:
“Behold a virgin shall be with child, and bring forth a son, and they shall call his name Emmanuel, which being interpreted is, God with us” (Matt. 1:23).