From: richarra@gmail.com   
      
   Christ's wounds bring healing and life   
      
   “The Lord of hosts was not signaling weakness as he gave sight to the   
   blind, made the crooked to stand upright, raised the dead to life   
   (Matthew 11:5), anticipated the effects of medicine at our prayers,   
   and cured those who sought after him. Those who merely touched the   
   fringe of his robe were healed (Mark 6:56). Surely you did not think   
   it was some divine weakness, you speculators, when you saw him   
   wounded. Indeed there were wounds that pierced his body (Matthew   
   27:35; Mark 15:24; Luke 23:33; John 19:18, 31-37), but they did not   
   demonstrate weakness but strength. For from these wounds flowed life   
   to all, from the One who was the life of all."   
   by Ambrose of Milan,(excerpt from ON THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 4.5.54–55.16)   
      
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   February 22nd - St. Margaret of Cortona   
      
   A penitent of the Third Order of St. Francis, born at Laviano in   
   Tuscany in 1247; died at Cortona, 22 February, 1297. At the age of 7   
   years Margaret lost her mother and two years later her father married   
   a second time. Between the daughter and her step-mother there seems to   
   have been but little sympathy or affection, and Margaret was one of   
   those natures who crave affection. When about 17 years of age she made   
   the acquaintance of a young cavalier, who, some say, was a son of   
   Gugliemo di Pecora, lord of Valiano, with whom she one night fled from   
   her father's house. Margaret in her confessions does not mention her   
   lover's name. For 9 years she lived with him in his castle near   
   Montepulciano, and a son was born to them. Frequently she besought her   
   lover to marry her; he as often promised to do so, but never did. In   
   her confessions she expressly says that she consented to her lover's   
   importunities unwillingly. Wadding and others who have described her   
   in these early years as an abandoned woman, either had not rightly   
   read her legend, or had deepened the shadows of her early life to make   
   her conversion seem the more wonderful. Even during this period   
   Margaret was very compassionate towards the poor and relieved their   
   wants; she was also accustomed to seek out quiet places where she   
   would dream of a life given to virtue and the love of God. Once some   
   of her neighbors bade her look to her soul before it was too late. She   
   replied that they need have no fear of her, for that she would die a   
   saint and that her critics would come as pilgrims to her shrine.   
      
   She was at last set free from her life of sin by the tragic death of   
   her lover, who was murdered whilst on a journey. Margaret's first   
   intimation of his death was the return of his favourite hound without   
   its master. The hound led her to his body. It was characteristic of   
   her generosity that she blamed herself for his irregular life, and   
   began to loathe her beauty which had fascinated him. She returned to   
   his relatives all the jewels and property he had given her and left   
   his home; and with her little son set out for her father's house. Her   
   father would have received her, but his wife refused, and Margaret and   
   her son were turned adrift. For a moment she felt tempted to trade   
   upon her beauty; but she prayed earnestly and in her soul she seemed   
   to hear a voice bidding her go to the Franciscan Friars at Cortona and   
   put herself under their spiritual direction. On her arrival at   
   Cortona, two ladies, noticing her loneliness, offered her assistance   
   and took her home with them. They afterwards introduced her to the   
   Franciscan Friars at the church of San Francesco in the city. For 3   
   years Margaret had to struggle hard with temptations. Naturally of a   
   gay spirit, she felt much drawn to the world. But temptation only   
   convinced her the more of the necessity of self-discipline and an   
   entire consecration of herself to religion. At times remorse for the   
   past would have led her into intemperate self-mortifications, but for   
   the wise advice of her confessors. As it was, she fasted rigorously,   
   abstaining altogether from flesh-meat, and generally subsisting upon   
   bread and herbs. Her great physical vitality made such penance a   
   necessity to her.   
      
   After 3 years of probation Margaret was admitted to the Third Order of   
   St. Francis, and from this time she lived in strict poverty. Following   
   the example of St. Francis, she went and begged her bread. But whilst   
   thus living on alms, she gave her services freely to others;   
   especially to the sick-poor whom she nursed. It was about the time   
   that she became a Franciscan tertiary that the revelations began which   
   form the chief feature in her story. It was in the year 1277, as she   
   was praying in the church of the Franciscan Friars, that she seemed to   
   hear these words: "What is thy wish, poverella?" and she replied: "I   
   neither seek nor wish for aught but Thee, my Lord Jesus." From this   
   time forth she lived in intimate communing with Christ. At first He   
   always addressed her as "poverella", and only after a time of   
   probation and purification did He call her "My child". But Margaret,   
   though coming to lead more and more the life of a recluse, was yet   
   active in the service of others. She prevailed upon the city of   
   Cortona to found a hospital for the sick-poor, and to supply nurses   
   for the hospital, she instituted a congregation of Tertiary Sisters,   
   known as le poverelle. She also established a confraternity of Our   
   Lady of Mercy; the members of which bound themselves to support the   
   hospital, and to help the needy wherever found, and particularly the   
   respectable poor. Moreover on several occasions Margaret intervened in   
   public affairs for the aim of putting an end to civic feuds. Twice in   
   obedience to a Divine command, she upbraided Guglielmo Ubertini Pazzi,   
   Bishop of Arezzo, in which diocese Cortona was situated, because he   
   lived more like a secular prince and soldier, than like a pastor of   
   souls. This prelate was killed in battle at Bibbiena in 1289. The year   
   previous to this, Margaret for the sake of greater quiet had removed   
   her lodging from the hospital she had founded to near the ruined   
   church of St. Basil above the city. This church she now caused to be   
   repaired. It was here that she spent her last years, and in this   
   church she was buried. But after her death it was rebuilt in more   
   magnificent style and dedicated in her own name. There her body   
   remains enshrined to this day, incorrupt, in a silver shrine over the   
   high-altar. Although honoured as a beata from the time of her death,   
   Margaret was not canonized until 16 May, 1728.   
      
   This version taken from:   
      
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