Margaret of Cortona

Margaret of Cortona (* 1247 in Laviano in Castiglione del Lago, Umbria, † February 22, 1297 in Cortona) was an Italian penitent and was a member of the Third Order of St. Francis of Assisi. She was canonized in 1728 by the Catholic Church.

Life

Margaret lost her mother at age seven, from which it was religiously educated. The father remarried, the ratio of very beautiful girl stepmother was and remained poor. At age 16, Margaret left her family and began living together unmarried with a nobleman. Nine years ' of sin and shame, "as she later said herself, she spent as a mistress of a man for whom she did not come as the wife in question, but as allowed her a much more comfortable life in their family. During this time she had a son.

When she was 25, she was dragged from her pooch in the forest. She found the nobleman who had been gone for days, killed and half consumed. That was the moment of her conversion: She saw herself without her lover in a hopeless situation and initially tried to return to her family. Her father wanted to record, but the stepmother did not want prevailed and Margareta was chased away.

She went to Cortona and tried to join a monastery. But there was doubted their repentance, they are not recorded. Finally, she was allowed in 1274 to enter the Third Order of St. Francis, where the Friars Minor soul leaders were. They tortured her body to destroy the effort her beauty, which it considered as the source of all evil. She complained publicly in their trespasses. Before the people they revered as a saint because of her penance, she took refuge in solitude. There they had to exist as a hermit on the one hand strong temptations and fears, on the other hand, she experienced mystical visions in which Christ assured his presence. She adored the pierced heart of Jesus and its internal and external suffering. In her Sacred Heart visions she received the revelation that every sin would the Lord anew wound, a topos which is also found in Angela of Foligno and Margaret Mary Alacoque.

Margaret kept her rigorous penance at, devoted himself selflessly nursing and founded in Cortona a hospital and an association of Terziarinnen ( female members of the Third Order ). Margaret died on February 22, 1297 in Cortona, where she enjoys special veneration to this day.

On May 16, 1728 was called by Pope Benedict XIII. canonized; she is the patroness of penitents and the town of Cortona. Their relics are located in the chancel of their church dedicated to Santa Margherita in Cortona. Especially in the Baroque period it was often depicted: A woman in the habit of the Third Order with cincture and rosary, scourge and skull. On many representations there is also a small dog. Your feast day is February 22, some places May 16