Today February 22

Today is the feast of St. Margaret of Cortona (1247 - 1297), rich man's mistress. The story of how she got there, and how she got to sainthood, is a long one. Well, at least the struggle to sanctity is -- the story of how she became Arsenio's mistress is a simple and sordid one. She was a happy little peasant girl but after her mom died her father remarried and the cold stepmother had no love for the little girl. She was a "hard and masterful woman who had no sympathy with the high-spirited and pleasure-loving girl," so after 6 years of fighting, the teenager ran away from home. First she lived on her own in the village of Cortona, flirting with the village boys, whom she found she could easily manipulate. There she caught the attention of the local landowner's son, Arsenio, who persuaded the lovely 13-year-old to move in with him. For 9 years she lived the life of Riley, with plenty of food to eat and servants to wait on her, marred only by the lack of commitment on the part of her lover. Finally, one day, her life turned. Arsenio's dog returned without him, cowering and whimpering in the kitchen. He tried to get Margaret to follow him and when he did, he led her to where her lover's body lay in the woods. The sight of the dead and decaying body caused Margaret to radically consider her own mortality. She repented of her fornication and immediately took the son she'd had with Arsenio and returned to her father's house. There he and the stepmother took them in, at least until her very public penance made him nervous. When she, in church, made a loud -- and detailed! -- public confession of her illicit affair of 9 years, he threw her out.

The Franciscans of Cortona kindly took her in and placed her (and her son) in a house with two sisters, Marinana and Raneria Moscari. There she lived for years -- humbly and very penitentially: sleeping on the floor, eating coarse food, beating herself occasionally. The priests remonstrated with her, but Margaret, no shrinking violet, talked back. "Do not ask me to come to terms with this body of mine, because I cannot afford it. Between me and my body there will be a struggle until death." In which I think she has a sane approach to self-denial (one way; not the ONLY way). See, she was struggling horrifically with sexual temptation, and physical penance is just what the doctor ordered. This world cannot see the reasoning there; besides, they generally see nothing wrong with sexual temptation in the first place! But Margaret prescribed strong medicine for her disease -- and it worked. She was able to give her life wholeheartedly to God and overcome her demons, so to speak. She even reached out to others and founded a hospital for the poor in Cortona and organized interested laity, men and women alike, to support it. She died as a Third Order Franciscan, a great and worthy laywoman. Dear St. Margaret, pray for us.