Colette (Coellet or Boylet, Nicolette), Saint

COLETTA (COELLET O BOYLET, NICOLETTE), SANTA

Feast day: 6 March

COLETTE (Coellet or Boylet, Nicolette), Saint. - Foundress of the Poor Clares known as Colettines, b. at Calceye, near Corbie, on 13 January 1381, d. at Ghent on 6 March 1447. At the age of 21 she became a recluse near the church of St. Mary of Corbie, leading a most austere life there for three years. Then, feeling called to a particular mission, she asked Cardinal Antonio di Challant (v.), legate of the antipope Benedict XIII, to be dispensed from perpetual enclosure. Having obtained the dispensation on 1 August 1406 (Acta SS. Martii, I, pp. 536-37), she entered shortly afterward among the Poor Clares, to whose reform she subsequently devoted her entire life. With the help of Blessed Henry of Baume and of Blanche of Geneva, she began in 1408 at Besançon her work of reform in a convent of Urbanist Poor Clares, founded on absolute poverty. There followed the foundations of Auxonne, Poligny, Decize and others, up to twenty-two. Her reform spread also among the Franciscans, giving rise to the so-called Colettines, suppressed by Leo X in 1517. She was beatified on 26 August 1740 by Benedict XIV, and canonized by Pius VII on 24 May 1807.

Bibliography4 works

BIBL.: Acta SS. Martii, I, Venice 1735, pp. 532-627; Martyr, Romanum, p. 87; A. Germain, S.te C. de Corbie, Paris 1903; U. d'Alençon, Les vies de Lte C. B. de Corbie... écrites par ses contemporains le p. Pierre de Reims dit de Vaux et sœur Perrine de la Roche et de Baume, Paris 1911.

Niccolò Del Re

@incollection{ec3_coletta_coellet_o_boylet_nicol, author = {Del, Re Niccolò}, title = {Coletta (Coellet O Boylet, nicolette), santa}, booktitle = {Enciclopedia Cattolica}, volume = {III}, pages = {1945--1946}, note = {Cited by column}, publisher = {Ente per l’Enciclopedia Cattolica e per il Libro Cattolico}, address = {Città del Vaticano}, year = {1949}, url = {https://azioneromana.com/article/coletta-coellet-o-boylet-nicolette-santa} }

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