Clare was the noble and lofty tree bringing forth
The Seraphic Mother cultivated a
deep sense of gratitude for the gift of faith which lasted until her dying
day.
But, she herself would begin by pointing us
back to the “good soil” where the seed of her faith was planted, tended
and flourished: her deeply Christian home.
Little is known about St. Clare’s father, the
knight Favarone di Offreduccio.
However, history has bequeathed to us some
precious details about her mother, the Lady Ortolana.
Alert in
mind, docile in spirit, keen in perception
VERSIFIED LEGEND,
Ortolana was well known for her deep faith.
And it was a faith that she did not keep to
herself. The early sources testify that the young Clare
received her faith from the
mouth of her mother, confirming how diligently Ortolana attended to
the duty of
evangelizing her children
and of being to them
the first herald
of the mysteries of the faith.
cf.
Catechism, #2225
Ortolana did
not confine her children’s “faith training” to the learning of doctrine,
though.
She who was called
a friend of piety also gave them an outstanding
example of religious devotion, manifested especially in her faithful and
fervent recourse to prayer and in her frequent pilgrimages to Christian
shrines and holy places.
It is not surprising, then, that her eldest
daughter began at an early age to
hold the pursuit of holy
prayer as a friend – even to keeping count of the Our
Fathers she prayed with a little pile of pebbles!
St.
Clare’s faith training went a step further.
Ortolana had a well-deserved reputation for
generosity to the poor, and she initiated her three daughters at an early
age in the Christian art of expressing their faith in God and their love
for God through concrete acts of self-giving and self-denial.
She,
by her
works, showed them her faith,
cf. James
Thus from her earliest years, Clare of
Assisi experienced firsthand how
faith grows when it is lived as an experience of love received and when it
is communicated as an experience of grace and joy.
Pope Benedict XVI,
Porta Fidei,
7
She shows what sweet and enduring fruit of
faith can come forth when
family catechesis precedes,
accompanies and enriches other forms of instruction in the faith.
Catechism, #2226
May her prayers and those
of Ortolana, her mother, help us all
to profess our faith in the
Risen Lord…in our homes and in our families so that everyone may
experience a strong need to know better and to transmit to future
generations the faith of all times.
Pope Benedict XVI,
Porta Fidei, 8