#St. Catherine

[scrollsofhumanlife]

Dorene Constancia "Consie" Johnson's ID card at the Brookdale Hospital Medical Center in Brooklyn

Born June 3 1934 in Bellas Gate, Saint Catherine Parish, Jamaica

Palm Bay, Florida

[orthodoxsoul]

Saint "Cat"herine wonders if you can find a cat more educated, more wealthy, or of higher birth than she

[postcard-from-the-past]

St. Catherine wooden church in Honfleur, Normandy region of France

French vintage postcard

[beautiful-belgium]

André Beauneveu - Saint Catherine (1380), Church of Our Lady, Kortrijk

Photographed by PMRMaeyaert in 2008

[abwwia]

Plautilla Nelli, St. Catherine with Lily (ca. 1550). Collection of Le Gallerie Degli Uffizi, Florence.

[mysterious-secret-garden]

Scenes from St. Catherine’s life: the cutting of her hair to signify her break with the world – Oratorio della Camera in the Sanctuary of the House of St. Catherine, Siena (Italy)

[dreaminginthedeepsouth]

From Anglicans Online

We doubt whether the name of Richard Hillary is particularly well known to many. Born in 1919 in Sydney, early in his life he came to England, was educated at Shrewsbury, and proceeded to Trinity College, Oxford. Possessed of a personality that courted daring and danger, he joined the University Air Squadron in 1938 and was called up to the Royal Air Force in 1939. He was handsome, flirtatious, and a bit unthinking. He flew brilliantly, but took risks. In August 1940 his plane was hit by gunfire and he bailed out of it, horrifically burned. Spending three excruciating months in hospital, he underwent a series of experimental plastic surgeries. He was eventually released, his striking face somewhat rebuilt, but still bearing the scars. His muscles were irreparably damaged and his movements forever impaired, but he insisted on resuming flying, despite being barely able to manipulate a knife and fork at the dinner table and despite all recommendation to the contrary. Hillary's last fatal flight was 'round midnight, 8 January 1943, wintry and windy. Shortly after take-off his plane straightaway ran into difficulty. The undercarriage would not come down for landing and the fuel was running low. Hillary and his navigator were instructed to circle a beacon near the centre of the aerodrome. 'Are you happy?', came the somewhat unusual question from the radiotelephone operator, querying their dire situation. 'Moderately', replied Hillary. 'I am continuing to circle'. Minutes after, the plane began losing altitude and soon smashed into the ground, killing both. On this last day after Pentecost or Sunday next before Advent or Stir-up Sunday or the Feat of Christ the King (however one counts it), Hillary's last words — 'I am continuing to circle' — resonate. We have come to the end of the Christian liturgical year, having woven our Sundays and Holy Days into yet one more annual ring of celebration, observance, feast, and fast. We have formed our circle once again. And yet, and yet, only for this life. Our yearly ring, through God's mercy and at a time unknown to us, will slow and stop. Our time will no longer be measured by feast and fast or marked off as 'ordinary'. We shan't 'continue to circle'. Our journey continues in a way we know not. But we trust it will continue, spiralling towards the centre, towards God. 'The disagreement between the two kinds of religion is chiefly on the point whether it is a good thing or a bad thing to be born at all', writes Eithne Wilkins*, continuing: 'The negative wheel is that which merely circles, causing birth and death to recur ceaselessly, and it also broke the spiked wheel of human passions under which we are torn to pieces. St Catherine might be regarded as a good Buddhist in that through her prayers she broke the wheel, so that it could no longer harm her, and after she was decapitated her unsullied body was wafted away by angels. She did not, in a negative sense, "continue to circle". The positive wheel is not that on which we dismally recognize "This is where we came in", but that with a spiralling movement towards the centre. It is the great glowing round that is also the western window, the rose'. We are part of the circle game of life, made meaningful by our following the pattern of Christian fast and feast, and marking the yearly passage of our pilgrimage. Our Lord broke through the circle of life and death on that first Easter, shattering its meaninglessness once for all: 'The Last Enemy to be destroyed is death'†. The circle was broken here on earth, spiralling to an eternal circle in the life of the world to come. Double helix indeed! And now — here's where we 'come in' — we stand on the threshold of Advent, waiting in this strange end-of-year space briefly before we enter that dark quiet time of count-down once again. The liturgical year is indeed a way of time travel, a circularity that brings with it the story of salvation. Our parts are waiting for us, if we will join in.

[Alive On All Channels]

[thewahookid]

Jesus Explains to St. Catherine How to Love Him with Great Love

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Jesus once asked Catherine of Siena, “My beloved, do you know why I love you?” In response to Catherine’s negative reply, Jesus continued, “I will tell you. If I cease to love you, you will be nothing; you will be incapable of anything good. Now you see why I have to love you.” “It is true,” Catherine replied, and suddenly she said, “I would like to love you like that.”

.

But as soon as she had spoken, she realized that what she had said was inappropriate. Jesus smiled. Then, she added, “But this is not fair. You can love me with great love, and I can only love you with small love.”

.

At that moment, Jesus interrupted, and said, “I have made it possible for you to love me with great love.” Surprised, she immediately asked Him how. “I have placed your neighbor at your side. Whatever you do to him, I will consider it as being done to me.” Catherine, full of joy, went running to care for the sick in the hospital: “Now I can love Jesus with great love.”

[kateshistoryspot]

Question From Facebook: What Historical Evidence is there of Jesus' [Member]?

So, interestingly enough, the only reference to Jesus' [member] is in the book of Luke, which mentions that Jesus was circumcised. However, in Saints' lore, there is a very interesting story pertaining to either St. Catherine of Alexandria or St. Catherine of Sienna. St. Catherine underwent a mystical marriage to Christ, in which he gave her his [tip] as a wedding ring. This wedding ring is a Catholic relic that has been portrayed in art since 1461.

[twobrothersatwork]

Arcangelo di Cola da Camerino (Italian, active 1416- 1429) Martyrdom of St. Catherine

[live-chaotically]

Bartolomeo Veneto, St. Catherine Crowned (detail), 1520

[cuties-in-codices]

st. catherine of siena drinking from christ's side wound

in a hagiography of st. catherine of siena, alsace, early 15th c.

source: Paris, BnF, ms. allem. 34, fol. 43v

[daughter-of-mary]

I got this image from an Instagram account called Mary_my_Mother

[postcard-from-the-past]

St. Catherine barracks in Briançon, Alpine region of France

French vintage postcard

[beautiful-belgium]

Unknown Flemish artist - St. Catherine Confronting the Emperor (c. 1480)

[blogdemocratesjr]

Joan of Arc by dashinvaine

All the popular religions in the world are made apprehensible by an array of legendary personages, with an Almighty Father, and sometimes a mother and divine child, as the central figures. These are presented to the mind's eye in childhood; and the result is a hallucination which persists strongly throughout life when it has been well impressed. Thus all the thinking of the hallucinated adult about the fountain of inspiration which is continually flowing in the universe, or about the promptings of virtue and the revulsions of shame: in short, about aspiration and conscience, both of which forces are matters of fact more obvious than electro-magnetism, is thinking in terms of the celestial vision. And when in the case of exceptionally imaginative persons, especially those practising certain appropriate austerities, the hallucination extends from the mind's eye to the body's, the visionary sees Krishna or the Buddha or the Blessed Virgin or St Catherine as the case may be.

—George Bernard Shaw, Saint Joan