Early Years

St. Catherine of Siena was born March 25, 1347 in Siena, Italy into a large middle-class family as the 25th child. Her father was a dyer and her mother the daughter of a local poet. Even at an early age, Catherine was a very holy person. At sixteen, St. Catherine took the habit of the Dominican Tertiaries in a little room in her father's house. She experienced celestial visions regularly and participated in familiar conversation with Christ. After 3 straight years of this (when she was around 19) She underwent "spiritual espousals", or was married to Christ. She then returned to her family and began to tend to the sick, serve the poor, and work for the conversion of sinners. Even though St. Catherine was so devoted to nothing but God and The Catholic Church and had little time to tend to her personal desires, people who knew her described her as good-natured and charming.