CLARE OF MONTEFALCO, ST.

Augustinian nun; b. Montefalco (province of Perugia) c. 1268; d. Montefalco, Aug. 17, 1308. Despite her youth, in 1275 Clare of Montefalco entered the enclosure where her older sister, Joanna, was living a type of religious life with other pious women. In 1290 the local bishop officially recognized the group as a monastic community and placed them under the Rule of St. augustine. When Joanna, who had been the superior, died in November of 1291, Clare was elected to succeed her. Her spirituality centered on the passion of Christ, and she was often favored with mystical visions. She also showed a practical concern for the poor and preserved her community from the errors of a quietist sect of the day in Umbria. After her death, the nuns, moved by her statement that she had the cross of Christ in her heart, opened her heart and found formations resembling the instruments of Christ's passion. A canonical investigation was soon undertaken by the bishop's representative, Berengario di Donadio, who wrote the first Life. In 1624 Urban VIII granted permission to use an office and Mass in her honor to the Augustinians and the diocese of Spoleto. Leo XIII canonized her in 1881. Beautiful 14th-century frescos adorn a chapel in her shrine at Montefalco. Her iconography often includes the opened heart with the instruments of the passion.

Feast: Aug. 17.

Bibliography: Sources. Acta Sanctorum Aug. 3: 676–688. b. di donadio, Vita Sancte Clare de Cruce, ed. a. semenza (Città del Vaticano 1943); St. Clare of the Cross of Montefalco, tr. m. o'connell and ed. j. e. rotelle (Villanova 1999). e. menestÒ, Il processo di canonizzazione di Chiara da Montefalco (Regione dell'Umbria 1984). Literature. Bibliotheca sanctorum 3:1217–24. La spiritualità di S. Chiara da Montefalco: Atti del I convegno di studio, Montefalco, 8–10 agosto 1985, ed. s. nessi (Montefalco 1986). r. sala, S. Chiara della Croce: La mistica Agostiniana di Montefalco (Rome 1977). S. Chiara da Montefalco e il suo tempo: Atti del quarto convegno di studi storici ecclesiastici, Spoleto, 28–30 dicembre 1981, ed. c. leonardi and e. menestÒ (Perugia 1985).

[k. a. gersbach]