St. Clare of Assisi

Chiara di Offreduccio, known to history as Clare of Assisi, was born in 1194 into a wealthy family in Assisi, Italy. Her father is traditionally identified as Favarone di Offreduccio, a man of means, and her mother as Ortolana. Because the family was noble and prosperous, Clare grew up surrounded by comfort and the privileges of her social class. Even as a young woman, however, she was drawn to prayer and reportedly showed little interest in the marriage her family expected of her. Clare's life changed dramatically after hearing the preaching of Francis, son of Pietro Bernardone, the wandering pen Franciscan who was beginning to attract followers in Assisi. Deeply moved, she sought him out and, on the night of Palm Sunday in 1212, left her family home to be received by Francis and his brothers at the little chapel of the Porziuncola. There she had her hair cut and was clothed in a rough penitential habit, becoming the first woman to join what would become the Franciscan movement. Francis placed Clare temporarily with a community of Benedictine nuns, and then brought her to San Damiano, the small church he had repaired, where she was eventually joined by her sister Agnes and other women. The community that gathered around Clare became known as the Order of Poor Ladies, or the Poor Clares, and embraced a life of strict poverty, enclosure, and contemplative prayer. Several times, Francis and Clare sought papal approval for this way of life; a privilege of poverty was granted by Pope Innocent III before his death in 1216, though the exact circumstances of early papal recognitions are debated by scholars. Around 1218 or 1219, Cardinal Ugolino, who would later become Pope Gregory IX, drew up a rule for the Poor Ladies based largely on Benedictine patterns adapted to Franciscan ideals. Clare accepted this rule for a time but never regarded it as a final statement of her vision. Late in life, just two days before her death, Pope Innocent IV approved a rule written in Clare's own hand, making her the first woman in Church history to write a monastic rule for women. She had fought throughout her life to protect the community's commitment to radical poverty, famously obtaining from Gregory IX the "Privilege of Poverty," which declared that the sisters could hold no property collectively. Clare led the community at San Damiano for more than forty years and became widely known for her holiness and her care for the sisters entrusted to her. According to a long-standing tradition, in 1240 she once held the Blessed Sacrament up against the walls of her convent as invading Saracen soldiers approached Assisi, and the army turned away. Whether or not the event occurred exactly as described, it became one of the most celebrated stories attached to her memory. In her final years she suffered from illness but continued to write letters to other Franciscan communities, including Agnes of Prague, offering spiritual counsel and encouragement. Clare died at San Damiano on August 11, 1253, at about fifty-nine years of age. Pope Alexander IV canonized her in 1255, only two years after her death, and her feast day is celebrated each year on August 11. She is buried in the Basilica of Santa Chiara in Assisi, which was built in her honor and houses the famous San Damiano crucifix, the very cross before which, according to tradition, Francis first heard the voice of Christ telling him to "repair my house." Clare is remembered as a founder, a mystic, and a woman whose insistence on Gospel poverty shaped an entire branch of the Franciscan family.