A tall, beautiful, imposing, luminous figure, cheerful with heavenly rejoicing, and a full voice with a gentle accent. In its tone it reminds me of the loving velvet of Mary Magdalene, and in its accent, the clearest Tuscan style of speech.
She says, “Sister, I, too, have come. Write down my words. They will bring you joy and great peace.” And she waits for me to take up the notebook and write this. She now speaks again:
“I am Catherine.774 You love me and do not love me, for you are like me, and yet you are frightened by my strength. Sweet sister, what are you frightened by? Don’t you know that my strength is the same as the strength in you: that of the gentle Lamb that bled to death? Oh, all his Blood is in those who love Him! And by this Blood, which is fire, we can act in the world, and in Heaven we rejoice. Can those who have that Blood with them fail to be strength and fire? And don’t you know that this Blood is the juice of God and possesses along with it what God’s essence is: perfect Charity? Rejoice, sister.
“It is fitting that you, too, as a lamb and falcon, should have had your Tuldo.775 It is fitting. You snatched away a greater prey with your loving face than I did on the scaffold. That one had committed a bloody crime; yours, a Satanic and spiritual crime. You led him to the same pasture, sweet lamb of my Shepherd, to the pasture of the three divine virtues and the infinite truths. You have given blood and fire. You will have blood and fire her as a robe and diadem.
“Sister, good-bye. Peace - that is, the sweet Lamb that bled to death - be with you always.”776
773 This entry is preceded by the following episodes, found in The First Year of the Public Life:
November 4 - “Jesus Preaches and Works Miracles in Peter’s House”;
November 5 - “Jesus Prays at Night”;
November 6 (apparently corrected on the 8th) - “The Leper Healed at Korazim.”
774 St. Catherine of Siena (1347-1380), Doctor of the Church.
775 The name of the young man condemned to death who was accompanied by St. Catherine and died in holiness.
776 On the same date the episode was written involving “The Paralytic Healed at Peter’s House in Capernaum,” found in The Third Year of the Public Life.