Page:A Dictionary of Saintly Women Volume 1.djvu/202

From Wikisource
Jump to navigation Jump to search
This page needs to be proofread.
188
188

188 B. CLARA influenced by this great saint, and was destined to effect the reform of the Dominican convent life so much desired by Catherine. When she was fifteen, she was dangerously ill in the absence of her husband. He died, and no one in the house dared to tell her. She anticipated the tidings by telling her father she heard an unusual sound of bells, and knew they were tolling for her husband's death. She soon recovered, and betook herself to the Franciscan convent of St. Martin, without consulting her family. They were very angry, and her brothers went with a number of armed men and broke open the gate. The terrified nuns immediately gave up their novice, and carried her into the church. It was then found that she had lost the use of her limbs, but this was restored on her being allowed to remain a nun. To prevent her going to one of the Francis- can convents at Rome, her brothers shut her up in a small room without a bed or the commonest comforts. In course of time, her father permitted her to join a sisterhood of Dominican nuns, where she took the veil and the name of Clara. He afterwards founded a small convent of the same order, at Pisa, of which she became prioress. Her sanctity was attested by miracles, both during her life and i^ter her death. Her imme- morial worship was confirmed by Pius VIII. B,M, Dominican Martyrology, Papebroch, in AA,SS, From MS. by a contemporary nun. Pio, Hiat, Bom. Saints, Mrs. Drane, Catherine of Siena, The important part taken by her family in the history of Pisa is told by Sismondi, Italian Bepuhlics^ iv. B. Clara (9), Sept. 10. Put to death in 1622, at Nagasaki, in Japan, with her husband, Domingo Xamada, or Ta- manda, on the same day as BB. Spinola and LucT Freitas. SS. Clara (lo) and Magdalene, MM. 17th century. Beheaded in Japan for the Christian faith, with their father and mother, Michael and Ursula, and a little brother. Honoured in the Me^ology of Laheriusj but not by the authority of the Church. AA.SS. B. Clara (ll), Dec. 25. f 1648. B. Claba BouKBELiJiiRS, or Claba of the Cross. O.S.D. A native of Dijon. When she was seven years old, the Child Jesus appeared to her with a heavy cross, and wanted her heart to plant the cross in, as He meant to make her a new Job. When very ill, she was very pious ; when better, she became lukewarm in her love of God. The company of other joua^ ladies distracted her. St. John the Evangelist appeared to her with a bandage on his eyes, because he had wept so much about her relapse. She became a nun in the monastery of St Catherine of Siena, at Dijon. The devil afflicted her with frightful temptations against innocence, faith, etc. She had the gift of prophecy, and foretold the birth of Louis XIV. long before the queen had any expectation of becoming a mother. Lima, Agiologio Bom, Ven. Clara (12) of Jesus, Jan. 26 (Tbevob Hanmek, Lady Warn eb). 163G- 1670. O.S.F. Baptized by the name of Trevor, after her godfather. Her father, Thomas Hanmer, held a good appoint- ment at the court of Charles I.; her mother, Elizabeth Baker, was maid of honour to Queen Henrietta Maria. Both were of the Anglican Church. After their marriage, they lived at his country house, Hanmer, in Wales, and there Trevor was bom. When Cromwell usurped the power, and persecuted the royalists and the Anglican Church, the Hanmers were obliged to emigrate. They lived for some time in a Roman Catholic family in Paris, where Mrs. Hanmer died. Thomas Hanmer then brought his daughter back to England, and married her, in 1659, to Sir John Warner, of Parham, in Suffolk, who, like themselves, was of the Anglican reform. Trevor had, however, imbibed Catholic ideas, and her brother, who had fled to Lisbon, had abjured the doctrines of the Beformation, and kept exhorting her to do the same. In 1664 Sir John Warner, and his wife Trevor, Lady Warner, became Boman Catholics, and from that time lived a pious and ascetic life, and resolved to become monk and nun as soon as they had set their affairs in order. This they did. He became a Jesuit ; she joined the English Clares at Gravelines, and took the name of Clara