Found some details fascinating and personally relevant.
Catherine of Siena was told by some priests they did not want her ecstasies at Mass. They also told her they did not want her sighs or to come up to receive Communion. Yes, they refused her Communion. The lead priest told the others, and that was that, for awhile.
The Lord provided for her in mystical ways sometimes; but other times she went without the tangible Eucharist and without any mystical offering by Jesus or angels. So she had spiritual Communion--that of her spirit desiring and her mind and heart meditating upon Christ Jesus and the Mass.
The more one reads of the well-researched biographies, especially those of Italian and other European writers of the past, the more details fill in to present a realistic depiction of these human beings' actual lives. Plus, as a bonus, one discovers much history, scenery, and other personages of the time period who interacted with the person being revealed.
While Catherine Benincasa was not a hermit, she did spend two or three years living in much solitude in a small room in her family's home. She called it her "cell." But the Lord had a more active mission for this young woman who loved Him above all else. He called her out of her solitary life, and commenced her life of active efforts in converting some of the most derelict souls, saving them from eternity in hell.
However, she soon would have a yet more visible mission--that of convincing the rightful Pope to return to Rome and quell the other two men who had claimed, each of them, the papacy.
The aspect of her treatment during Mass, is well to note, as we often think that actual people did not have issues with the spiritual gifts God gave that others noticed, nor that priests or rectors or parishioners ever committed non-Christian offenses toward the ones with mystical experiences.
[In a previous post, the details of how when in her mystical state during Mass, people would pinch and criticize her. One time a couple of men lifted her up bodily, one on each side of her, carried her out of Mass and dumped her by the street outside where people came along and kicked her. After awhile, she returned to herself, out of the ecstasy, and took her very bruised body home. Honestly....]
They did. They do. They ought not, from our perspective. It does seem Catholics ought to learn from history; but His Real Presence knows, and what is learned as a result of ill treatment to some, by the ones being ill-treated, is just what Jesus experienced in His life on earth. And that is what those desirous of union with Christ must experience in order to fully grasp and be one with the Beloved, for that which is unlike the other, cannot unite as One with His Real Presence.
God bless His Real Presence in us. Little children, let us love one another, for God Is Love! Remain in His Love!
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