St. Catherine of Siena

The 24th of 25 children born to a wool-dyer in Siena, Catherine vowed her life to Christ at age seven and resisted all attempts to marry her off. She became a Dominican tertiary at sixteen, living three years of silence and prayer in her family’s home before emerging to serve the sick and dying of plague-stricken Tuscany.

She had no formal schooling, yet popes and princes sought her counsel. Her letters — direct, fearless, and tender — convinced Pope Gregory XI to return the papacy from Avignon to Rome in 1377, ending nearly seventy years of exile. Her Dialogue, dictated in mystical ecstasy, is one of the great spiritual classics.

She was named a Doctor of the Church in 1970 — only the second woman, alongside Teresa of Ávila, to hold that title. Her famous charge to her followers: "Be who God meant you to be, and you will set the world on fire."