Search this book
How S. Clare, being sick, was miraculously carried, on the night of Christmas Eve, to the church of S. Francis and there heard the office
How S, Ciare, being sick, zuas miraculously carried, on the night of Christmas Eve, to the church of S. Francis and there heard the office
It befell on a time that S. Clare was grievously sick, so that she could not go at all to say the office in church with the other nuns; when the feast of the Nativity of Christ came round, all the others went to Matins: but she remained in her bed ill-content, for that she could not go with the others and partake of that spiritual consolation. But Jesu Christ, her spouse, desiring not to leave her thus disconsolate, caused her to be miraculously carried to the church of S. Francis and to be present at the whole of the office of Matins and the midnight Mass, and beyond all this to receive the Holy Communion and then be carried back to her bed. When the nuns came back to S. Clare, after the office in S. Damian's was over, they said to her: " O our mother, Sister Clare, what sweet consolation have we had on this holy feast of the Nativity! oh, would that it had pleased God that you had been with us there! " And S. Clare replied: ” Praise and glory do I give unto our Lord Jesu Christ, the blessed One, my sisters and daughters most dear; for that with much consolation to my soul I have had part in all the solemn rites of this most holy night, and even more than ye: sith through the loving care of my father, S. Francis, and the grace of our Lord Jesu Christ, I have been present in the church of my venerable father, S. Francis, and with the ears of my body and my mind have heard all the office and the sound of the organs that was made there, and in the same place have taken the most holy Communion. Wherefore for such grace bestowed upon me rejoice and give thanks to our Lord Jesu Christ."
I04 THE LITTLE FLOWERS OF