VANNINI, CATERINA, Venerable. – Nun, convert, known as the Sienese Thaïs, b. in Siena on 30 May 1562, d. 30 July 1606.
She soon yielded to the allurements of vanity and pleasure and soon became the Aspasia of the Renaissance. She was imprisoned by order of Gregory XIII, but, having shown signs of repentance, was released.
Vannes, diocese of – Façade of the cathedral of St Peter (15th–16th c.).
Returning to Siena, she took up a life of severe penance. After overcoming various temptations, she was favoured with ecstasies and miracles. In 1584 she entered the Convertite, where she was divinely instructed in reading and writing and enriched with mystical graces. For sixteen years she lived enclosed in a cell ten palms long and eight wide, with a small window opening into the church. Through her prayers and penances she converted many sinners. Her reputation for holiness drew many illustrious persons to seek her counsel; among them Cardinals C. Baronius and F. Borromeo, who wrote her life and maintained an assiduous correspondence with her (1600–1606).
Devoted to the Blessed Virgin, she dictated to the Sienese nobleman Ottone Ottorenghi a Modo per eccitare e ammaestrare il semplici e poco esperti a recitare con qualche frutto il S.mo Rosario (Siena 1606), contenting herself with things read, heard or copied, even drawn from the legends of the apocryphal Gospels, and little versed in the recitation itself. Yet Cardinal F. Borromeo wrote (11 Dec. 1606) to Pier Luigi Capacci, V.’s confessor, that “the Rosary is beautiful, and composed with great light, and will bear fruit.” Her cause of beatification was introduced in 1693.
Felice da Mareto