Angela Merici was born at Desenzano, in the territory of Venice. From her earliest years, she kept the strictest guard over the lily of her virginity, which she had resolved should never be taken from her. Hating all feminine adornments, she made a point of making the beauty of her features and her attractive hair unsightly, that she might find no favor save with the heavenly Spouse of souls. While yet in the bloom of her youth, she lost her parents, and tried to retire into a desert, that she might lead a life of penance; but being prevented by an uncle, she fulfilled at home what she was not permitted to do in a wilderness. She frequently wore a hairshirt, and took the discipline. She never ate meat, except in case of sickness; she never tasted wine, except on the feasts of the Lord's Nativity and Resurrection; and, at times, she would pass whole days without taking any food. Devoted to prayer, she took her very short rests on the ground. When the devil sought to beguile her in the form of an angel of light, she quickly detected him, and put him to flight. At length, having resigned the fortune left by her father, she accepted the habit and rule of the Third Order of St. Francis. At Brescia, being commanded by a voice from Heaven and by a vision, she founded a new society of virgins, under a fixed discipline and holy rules of life. She put them under the title and patronage of St. Ursula, the brave leader of virgins. She foretold, shortly before her death, that this institute would last to the end of the world. She died in 1540 and was canonized in 1807.

Reflection — To will is for us; to accomplish for God, who chooses the times and the means. After Angela's death her order grew and spread throughout the world.

     Among the disciples of the apostles in the primitive age of saints this holy virgin shone as a bright star in the Church. She lived when Christians were more solicitous to live well than to write much: they knew how to die for Christ, but did not compile long books in which vanity has often a greater share than charity. Hence no particular account of her actions has been handed down to us. But how eminent her sanctity was we may judge from the lustre by which it was distinguished among apostles, prophets, and martyrs. She is said to have been a daughter of the apostle St. Peter; that St. Peter was married before his vocation to the apostleship we learn from the Gospel. St. Clement of Alexandria assures us that his wife attained to the glory of martyrdom, at which Peter himself encouraged her, bidding her to remember Our Lord. But it seems not certain whether St. Petronilla was more than the spiritual daughter of that apostle. She flourished at Rome, and was buried on the way to Ardea, where in ancient times a cemetery and a church bore her name.

Reflection — With the saints the great end for which they lived was always present to their minds, and they thought every moment lost in which they did not make some advances toward eternal bliss. How will their example condemn at the last day the trifling fooleries and the greatest part of the conversation and employments of the world, which aim at nothing but present amusements, and forget the only important affair—the business of eternity.

Taken from Father Alban Butler's "Lives of the Saints for Every Day in the Year — With Reflections" Copyright 1955.