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Right then she counseled that such an unheard-of miracle should not be disguised or hidden any further. Rather, she wisely advised it should be displayed for all to see with their own eyes. All ran eagerly to see this sight.a They were able to verify for themselves that God had not done thus for any other nation and stood in awe.
Here I will put down my pen rather than stammer over something I cannot explain. Giovanni Frigia Pennate,b who was then a boy, and afterwards a Roman proconsul and count of the Sacred Palace, freely swears and declares, against all doubts, that at that time he was with his mother, and that he saw with his own eyes and touched it with his hands. The lady pilgrim may now return to her homeland,c comforted by this privilege of grace. Let us now turn to events after the saint's death.
Chapter VII
THE DEAD RAISED THROUGH THE MERITS
OF BLESSED FRANCIS d
40I turn now to those who were raised from the dead through the merits of the confessor of Christ. I ask the attention of listeners and readers alike. For the sake of brevity I will omit many of the circumstances, and will keep silent about the account of the amazed witnesses, recounting only the extraordinary events themselves.
There was a woman, noble by birth and nobler in virtue, in Monte Marano near Benevento. She clung to Saint Francis with special devotion and offered him her reverent service. She took sick and her end seemed near: she was going the way of all flesh. She died at sundown, but burial was delayed to the following day to allow her many dear ones to gather. The clergy came at night with their psalters to sing the wake and vigils. There was a gathering of many of both sexes for prayer. Suddenly, in the sight of all, the woman sat up in bed and
- Cf. 1C 113.
- His is another form of the family surname (also rendered Frangipani). Cf. AC 8, note. Giovanni was the eldest son of Lady Jacoba; in 1226 he would have been a young man, rather than a boy.
- That is, to Rome, or possibly to heaven.
- Although there are no miracles of resurrection described in Thomas’s earlier works, the accounts given here reflect the tendencies of the late thirteenth and fourteenth centuries. André Vauchez explains: "This should probably be seen as a consequence of the development of the canonization procedure rather than of a change of attitude on the part of the faithful toward the saints. Aware that it was difficult to get a favorable decision out of the papacy and that the Curia was very demanding with regard to miracles, the promoters of a cause were tempted to raise the threshold of the miraculous to prove the sanctity of their candidates." Vauchez, Sainthood in the Later Middle Ages, translated by Jean Birrell (Cambridge, New York, Melbourne: Cambridge University Press, 1997), 467. A thorough study of the understanding of miraculous phenomena in the Middle Ages can be found in Benedicta Ward, Miracles and the Medieval Mind: Theory, Record and Events, 1000-1215 (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1982).