Ave Maria Meditations
St Clare…Illuminated by divine grace, she let herself be drawn to the new form of evangelical life initiated by St Francis and his companions, and decided, in her turn, to embark on a more radical following of Christ. She left her father’s house during the night between Palm Sunday and the Monday of Holy Week of 1211 (or 1212), and following the advice of the Saint himself she went to the small church of the Portiuncula, heart of the Franciscan experience, where in front of the altar of the Blessed Virgin Mary she divested herself of all her riches, to be reclothed in the poor habit of penance in the form of a cross…
After a brief period of searching, she came to rest in the small monastery of St Damian, where her younger sister Agnes followed her soon after. Here other companions joined her, desiring to incarnate the Gospel in a contemplative dimension. The determination with which the new monastic community followed in the footprints of Christ, considering poverty, hard work, tribulation, humility and contempt of the world as great spiritual joys, moved St Francis to write to them with fatherly affection: “Because by divine inspiration you have made yourselves daughters and servants of the Most High King, the heavenly Father, and have espoused yourselves to the Holy Spirit, choosing to live according to the perfection of the holy Gospel, I resolve and promise for myself and for my brothers to always have that same loving care and solicitude for you as [I have] for them”
Clare perceived her vocation as a call to follow the example of Mary, who offered her own virginity to the action of the Holy Spirit to become the Mother of Christ and of His Mystical Body. She felt closely united to the Mother of the Lord and because of this, urged St Agnes of Prague, the Bohemian princess who became a Poor Clare: “May you cling to his most sweet Mother who gave birth to a Son whom the heavens could not contain, and yet, she carried Him in the little enclosure of her holy womb, and held him on her virginal lap”…
The figure of Mary accompanied the vocational walk of the Saint of Assisi until the end of her life. According to a noteworthy testimony given at the Process of Canonization, Our Lady approached Clare on her deathbed, bending over her, whose life was a radiant image of Her own…
Clare’s gaze remained fixed on the Son of God to the end, in ceaseless contemplation of his mysteries. Hers was the loving gaze of the spouse, filled with the desire of an ever more complete sharing. She was immersed particularly in the meditation of the Passion, contemplating the mystery of Christ, who from the heights of the Cross called her and drew her [to him]. Thus, she wrote: “”All you who pass by the way, look and see if there is any suffering like my suffering!’. Let us respond with one voice, with one spirit, to Him, crying and grieving, Who said: Remembering you over and over makes my soul perish within me” (Fourth Letter to Agnes of Prague, 25-26). And she urged: “Let yourself be inflamed more strongly with the fervour of charity!… And sigh… in the great desire of your heart… may you cry out: Draw me after you… O Heavenly Spouse!”
From the Message of St. John Paul II to the Poor Clares (The Vatican, 9 August 2003)
