April 29th is a special day for me as it is the feast of St. Catherine of Siena. Catherine is a special saintly friend for me and one who inspires me with her fierceness, her maternal care, and here deep faith. Whenever her feast comes around, I try to share something of her life in order to help people come to know and love her more deeply.
A big part of Catherine’s life was writing letters. To anyone and everyone. Catherine writes hundreds of letters in her life. I hope to share more of her letters throughout the year with you all. This letter which I recorded myself is written to brother Bartolomeo Dominici, a Dominican friar and confessor to Catherine. She writes to him, encouraging him to grow in love and desire for God.
She speaks of “eating souls” and calls souls the “food in which God delights.” For Catherine nothing is more important than being helpful and useful to the souls of her neighbors. She often weeps for her neighbors and for all people, praying for their salvation with deep compassion. Eating souls for doesn’t mean kill or consuming, but sharing in God’s hunger and thirst for people to come to Him and to love him. Catherine takes this in part from Scripture when Jesus on the Cross says “he thirsts.” Jesus has a hunger and thirst not only for food and drink, but for salvation for all people, for peace and justice, etc.
May we all grow in hunger and thirst for the salvation of all.
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