Lettere

Description

Volpato digitized the ed. Theseider began (Noffke vol. 1 p. xxiv, PDF p. 24).

her famous letter to Avignone Pope Gregory XI (1376): Letter #233 (ref:262.20)

Letter #262 (ref:292.6) seems to imply her (really, she's speaking to another's) mystical ring of flesh as being made of Christ's foreskin, but she doesn't say that. Bl. Raymond (ref:18.5,8) describes her ring as "a gold ring with four pearls set in a circle in it and a wonderful diamond in the middle"; diamond = strong faith, pearls = purity of intention, thought, word, and deed. She wrote:

when He was circumcised, as much flesh was raised in the circumcision as one end of a ring, as a sign that as a bridegroom he wished to marry the human generation

quando elli fu circunciso, tanta carne si levò ne la circuncisione quanto una estremità d'uno anello, in segno che come sposo voleva sposare l'umana generazione

St. Catherine addresses other brides of Christ and is not speaking of herself when she discusses circumcision and mystical espousals.

her handwriting or a copyist's?:

Oimé, non più tacere! Gridate con centomiglia di lingue. Veggo che, per lo tacere, el mondo è guasto, la Sposa di Cristo è impalidita (Lettera 16, "A uno grande prelato") "O alas, be silent no more! Shout with a hundred thousand tongues. I see that, through silence, the world is broken, the Bride of Christ is impaled"