Antique wood travellers reliquary with a relic for Saint Coleta.

Antique wood travellers reliquary with a relic for Saint Coleta.

France early 1900.

Size: 4 cm diameter x 1 cm H

SAINT COLETTE

Colette of Corbie, PCC (13 January 1381 – 6 March 1447) was a French abbess and the foundress of the Colettine Poor Clares, a reform branch of the Order of Saint Clare, better known as the Poor Clares. She is honored as a saint in the Catholic Church. Due to a number of miraculous events claimed during her life, she is venerated as a patron saint of women seeking to conceive, expectant mothers, and sick children.

According to biographers, Colette performed numerous miracles, including multiplication of food or wine and effecting cures, partly after her death.

While traveling to Nice to meet Pope Benedict, Colette stayed at the home of a friend. His wife was in labor at that time with their third child, and was having major difficulties in the childbirth, leaving her in danger of death. Colette immediately went to the local church to pray for her.

The mother gave birth successfully and survived the ordeal. She credited Colette's prayers for this. The child born, a girl named Petronilla, later entered a monastery founded by Colette. She would become Colette's secretary and biographer.

After the pope had authorized Colette to establish a regimen of strict poverty in the Poor Clare monasteries of France, she started with that of Besançon. The local populace was suspicious of her reform, with its total reliance on them for the sustenance of the monastery. One incident helped turn this around.

Colette was beatified 23 January 1740 by Pope Clement XII and was canonized on 24 May 1807 by Pope Pius VII. She is invoked by childless couples desiring to become parents and is also the patroness of expectant mothers and sick infants.