I'm Sorry...Did You Say 25?

 Francesco Brizio, St Catherine's Mystic Communion, Basilica of San Demenico, Bologna

Today is the Feast Day of St. Catherine of Siena, the first (along with St. Teresa Avila) woman Doctor of the Church. I read her biography (from Butler's Lives of the Saints) to my PSR class on Sunday, and it begins, "The twenty-fifth child of an Italian wool-dyer..." They could understand the mystical visions and the stigmata, but TWENTY-FOUR brothers and sisters??? No.

Catherine died at the age of 33 (sound familiar?). Her remains are in the Chapel of St. Catherine in the Basilica of Santa Maria sopra Minerva in Rome. Mostly. Her head got cut off and put inside a bronze bust and it was sent to Siena. Along with her thumb, which is incorruptible.