Angelina di Marsciano

Angelina di Marsciano, T.O.R.
Foundress, Abbess
Born	1377 Montegiove, Italy
Died	14 July 1435 Foligno, Italy
Honored in	Roman Catholic Church
Beatified	8 March 1825 (cultus confirmed) by Pope Leo XII
Feast	14 July

Blessed Angelina di Marsciano, T.O.R., (1377 – 1435) was an Italian religious Sister and foundress, and is a beata of the Roman Catholic Church. She founded a congregation of Third Order Regular Sisters, known today as the Franciscan Sisters of Blessed Angelina. Some credit her with the founding of the Franciscan Third Order Regular, as her religious congregation marked the establishment of the first Franciscan community of women living under the Rule of the Third Order Regular, authorized by Pope Nicholas V. Unlike the Second Order of the Franciscan movement, the Poor Clare nuns, they were not an enclosed religious order, but have been active in serving the poor around them throughout their history.

Biography

In 1377, Angelina was born into a noble family in Montegiove, near Orvieto. She was the daughter of Jacopo, Count of Marsciano, and Anna, the daughter of the count of Corbara. This is why sometimes she is referred to as Angelina of Corbara.

Angelina got married, at the age of 15, to the count of Civitella, Giovanni da Terni. However, he died only two years later, leaving Angelina in charge of the estate of Civitella del Tronto.

It was then that Angelina made the decision to dedicate her life to God (it would appear that she had considered being a nun before she was married). She was clothed as a Franciscan tertiary and, with several companions, began an apostolic mission around the country, preaching the values of repentance and virginity, as well as service to those in need.

Her progress was arrested by the disturbance she caused in the communities where she called for young women to adopt religious life. She was doubly charged with sorcery, the imagined origin of her sway over women, and heresy, because of her allegedly Manichean opposition to marriage. Angelina defended herself before Ladislas, the king of Naples, who dismissed the charges, but exiled her and her companions to avoid further complaints.

She continued on to Assisi, and stopped to rest at Basilica of Santa Maria degli Angeli. There, she experienced a vision, wherein God instructed her to found a cloistered monastery under the Rule of the Third Order of Saint Francis in Foligno. The local bishop approved the plans with little hesitation, as they meant an end to her troublesome active ministry.

It was 1397 when the convent was opened, whereupon it was dedicated to Saint Anne. Angelina was Superior of the twelve founding members. This endeavor was so successful, monasteries soon opened in Florence, Spoleto, Assisi, and Viterbo, along with eleven others before Blessed Angelina's death in 1436.

Veneration and cultus

Blessed Angelina was interred in a Franciscan church in Foligno upon her death. Her remains were removed to a grander shrine in 1492. Her cultus was finally approved in 1825.

Her communities gained greatest popularity in the 15th and 16th centuries. In 1428, Pope Martin V had put them under the jurisdiction of the Friars Minor, with a specific mandate for the education and instruction of young girls. Even so, their work was fairly apostolic until it became an enclosed religious order in 1617, having taken solemn vows with a strict separation from the affairs of the external world.. With a 1903 lift of papal enclosure, a wider apostolate was permitted, and the congregation became known again as the Franciscan Sisters of Blessed Angelina. As of 1750, they consisted of 11 houses and 80 members.

As of the year A.D. 2000, they have houses in Brazil, Madagascar and Switzerland, as well as in Italy.

See also

• Third Order of St. Francis
• Counts of Marsciano (Italian)

External links

• Patron Saints Index entry [1]
• Vita della beata Angelina Corbara contessa di Civitella dell'Abruzzo (Italian)
• Official web site of Suore terziarie francescane della Beata Angelina di Marsciano (Italian)