PAOLA ROMANA, Saint. — Born in Rome on 5 May 347 to a Christian patrician family. Around the age of 15, she married TOSSAZIO, a pagan but tolerant man, by whom she had five children: Blesilla, Paolina, Eustochio, Rufina, and Tossazio. Though of a pious and merciful disposition, Paola indulged in the luxury of a noble life. At the age of 31, widowed, she felt drawn to embrace the ascetic ideal of Marcella (q.v.). Eustochio followed her mother and became a devoted disciple of Marcella.
Paola’s household thus gathered a community of women, friends, servants, and clients bound by a holy purpose, an embryonic form of monastic vows then considered the sublimation of baptismal promises. St. Jerome, who had returned to Rome in 382 and remained there until the death of Pope Damasus, became the spiritual father and Scripture teacher of Marcella’s monastic community. Paola also attended his remarkable lessons, learned Hebrew there, and distinguished herself by her progress in biblical scholarship. Paola’s daughter Blesilla, widowed after only seven months of marriage, eventually converted to her mother’s ideal after much hesitation, but the intensity of her penitential life affected her health and led to her death (November 384), soon followed by that of Pope Damasus. Jerome faced growing discontent among the Roman populace and clergy, whom he had criticized especially in Letter 21 to Eustochio, and in August 385 he departed for the East.
At his departure, Paola felt an increased longing to spend the remainder of her life in the Holy Land and to found a monastery there. With great sorrow she left her family (Paolina was married to Pammachius, Rufina was about to marry, and the young Tossazio was entrusted to Paolina) and sailed with Eustochio (autumn 385) to Salamis, where she was hosted by Epiphanius. From there she went to Antioch, as a guest of Paulinus. From Antioch, despite the winter season, she set out with Jerome for Jerusalem and toured Palestine. The following spring they traveled to Egypt, where in Alexandria they attended the lectures of Didymus the Blind. They continued their journey into the desert of Nitria and Arsinoë to experience the great monastic life firsthand. Returning to the Holy Land, Paola settled permanently in Bethlehem during the summer. There, at her own expense, three buildings were erected: one as a hospice for pilgrims, another as a monastery for Jerome and his companions, and a third for Paola and her religious women. The latter was dedicated to St. Catherine of Alexandria, enclosed by a wall and a tower.
The religious women, following the Pachomian system, were divided into three groups according to social status—nobles, slaves, and those of middle rank—each with its own quarters and superior; they gathered together in the common chapel. Their occupations included making clothing for themselves and the poor, liturgical prayer (matins, terce, sext, none, vespers), and the study of Holy Scripture.
Life in Paola’s monastery was strict: no meat or wine except for the sick; all wore woolen habits, with linen only for towels. Paola, knowing how to temper Roman severity with gentleness, attracted religious women from across the empire. Preceded in death by all her children except Eustochio, she died on 26 January 404 at the age of 56. She was buried near the Holy Cave of the Nativity. Her successors in the administration of the monastery were Eustochio and then her granddaughter Paola, daughter of Tossazio and Leta. Her feast is celebrated on 26 January.