Many Catholics of my generation and older have been influenced by women religious who educated us as young Catholics. In my life, it was the Ursuline Sisters, founded in the early sixteenth century by Angela Merici. The Ursulines were the first Catholic women’s congregation devoted to teaching.
Angela joined the lay Franciscan movement while still a young woman. She was attracted to a life of simplicity, and moved to work with poor children as a teacher. She was gifted with gifts of leadership that drew others to her. She gathered others around her who shared her vision. But it was not until her late fifties that her “Company of St. Ursula” took shape. Their goal was to reinvigorate Christian life by training women for marriage and family life.
A good teacher, in a real sense, is doing the work of God. In today’s passage from Isaiah, God claims the role of teacher, leading us and offering the commandments as the way to life. Let us be grateful for Angela, and those who came after her, who taught us in the faith, and in doing so, imitated our God.
—adapted from the book Advent with the Saints: Daily Reflections
by Greg Friedman, OFM
