Church History, Volume 2 (of 3)Kurtz, J. H. (Johann Heinrich)
History
Church History, Volume 2 (of 3)
Kurtz, J. H. (Johann Heinrich)
Church history
§ 105.3. =Two Royal Saints.=--=St. Elizabeth=, daughter of
Andrew II. of Hungary, married in her 14th year to St. Louis IV.,
Landgrave of Thuringia, was made a widow in her 20th year
by the death of her husband in the crusade of Frederick II.
in A.D. 1227, and thereafter suffered many privations at the
hand of her brother-in-law. Her father confessor inspired her
with a fanatical spirit of self denial. She assumed in Marburg
the garb of the Franciscan nuns, took the three vows, and retired
into a house of mercy, where she submitted to be scourged by
her confessor. There she died in her 24th year in A.D. 1231.
Her remains are credited with the performance of many miracles.
She was canonized by Gregory IX., in A.D. 1235, and in the
14th century the order of Elizabethan nuns was instituted for
ministering to the poor and sick.[316]--=St. Hedwig=, aunt of
Elizabeth, married Henry duke of Silesia, in her 12th year.
After discharging her duties of wife, mother, and princess
faithfully, she took along with her husband the vow of chastity,
and out of the sale of her bridal ornaments built a nunnery at
Trebnitz, where she died in A.D. 1243 in her 69th year. Canonized
in A.D. 1268, her remains were deposited in the convent church,
which became on that account a favourite resort of pilgrims.
§ 105.4. =Evidences of Sainthood.=
1. =Stigmatization.= Soon after St. Francis’ death in A.D. 1226,
the legend spread that two years before, during a forty days’
fast in the Apennines, a six-winged seraph imprinted on his
body the nail prints of the wounded Saviour. The saint’s
humility, it was said, prevented him speaking of the miracle
except to those in closest terms of intimacy. The papal bull
canonizing the saint, however, issued in A.D. 1228, knows
nothing of this wonderful occurrence. What was then told of
the great saint was subsequently ascribed to about 100 other
ascetics, male and female. Some sceptical critics attributed
the phenomenon to an impressionable temperament, others
again accounted for all such stories by assuming that they
were purely fabulous, or that the marks had been deceitfully
made with human hands. Undoubtedly St. Francis had made
those wounds upon his own body. That pain should have been
felt on certain occasions in the wounds may be accounted for,
especially in the case of females, who constituted the great
majority of stigmatized individuals, on pathological grounds.
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