worldly interests of my family. See now how I am punished: they bestow not so much as a passing thought upon me: my parents, my children, those friends with whom I was most intimate — all have forgotten me."
Mary Villani begged this soul to allow her to feel some thing of what she suffered, and immediately it appeared as though a finger of fire touched her forehead, and the pain which she experienced instantly caused her ecstasy to cease, The mark remained, and so deep and painful was it that two months afterwards it was still to be seen, and caused the holy Religious most terrible suffering. She endured this pain in the spirit of penance, for the relief of the soul that had appeared to her, and some time later the same soul came to announce her deliverance.
CHAPTER XXX.
Matter of Expiation — Sins of Youth — St. Catherine of Sweden and the Princess Gida.
It often happens that Christians do not sufficiently reflect on the necessity of doing penance for the sins of their youth: they must one day be atoned for by the most rigorous penance of Purgatory. Such was the case with the Princess Gida, daughter-in-law of St. Bridget, as we read in the "Lives of the Saints," March 24, Life of St. Catherine. [1] St. Bridget was in Rome with her daughter, Catherine, when the latter had an apparition of the soul of her sister-in-law, Gida, of whose death she was ignorant. Being one day in prayer in the ancient basilica of St. Peter, Catherine saw before her a woman dressed in a white robe and black mantle, and who came to ask her
- ↑ Cf. Merv., 823.
