Chapter XV: Florence Under an Interdict

Sunday, December 16, 2012
[Monday, December 17, 2012 due to complications of illness]

Catherine of Siena by Sigrid Undset
Chapter XV

Another point I was unclear about from Dr. Carole Levin - Catherine set out to the Pope in Avignon as the delegate and only hope of Florence with full authority to settle the future of that city.  Yes, the daughter of a dyer from Siena.  I know.  So much cooler, really, than just picking up and going there.  Hard to say which is more audacious, but it shows just how much influence Catherine had.  She came as a figure of power, greatly respected, and already comfortable taking the Pope to task in her letters - the indecisive Gregory XI.

In this chapter, the Pope, after much back and forth in the war-ish-thing with Florence, issues and Interdict on the city - cutting it off from the Church and thus declaring its citizens across the world as completely fair game.

Catherine urges a return to the true purpose of the Church - amassing spiritual treasures rather the worldly concerns.  This call is particularly important considering the amount of temporal protection the Church wielded and the callous way it would remove that protection.

Here Catherine and I are completely in agreement.  This is one of the many scary sides of the Church having temporal, worldly power.  I see in this chapter the pedophilia scandals of the current Church.  I realize that's not quite right, but it's the ugly world of earthly politics getting all mixed up in an institution with a holy responsibility.

People make up the Church, there is no getting around that nor should there be, but the Church should attract the very best.  The Church should be setting the standard for responsible, loving, peaceful government throughout the world.  The Church should be able to do better with the significant advantage of knowing that all this world is dust and its concerns passing.

I will have to watch Catherine closely in the days to come to see how she manages to help matters.  Along the way, unfortunately, to the Great Schism.  Perhaps we struggle on and on, hoping for a few moments when our better natures prevail and the Spirit shines in us.  And then if we mess it up again, we have to just keep struggling.

Anyway, that's how a sick and very medicated person reads Catherine's struggles and their aftermaths, such as I remember of them.