María de Agreda

Infobox Saint
name=Venerable María de Jesús de Ágreda
birth_date=2 April 1602
death_date=24 May 1665 (aged 63)
feast_day=–
venerated_in=Roman Catholic Church


imagesize=200px
caption=Sister María de Jesús de Ágreda
birth_place=Ágreda, Spain
death_place=Ágreda, Spain
titles=Venerable
beatified_date=
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beatified_by=
canonized_date=
canonized_place=
canonized_by=
attributes=
patronage=
major_shrine=Monastery of La Concepción
(founded in the 18th century by the Sister María de Jesús de Ágreda and where her incorrupt body rests)
suppressed_date=
issues=
prayer=

María Fernández Coronel y Arana, Abbess of Ágreda or, known in religion as Sor (Sister) María de Jesús de Ágreda (2 April 1602 – 24 May 1665), also known as the Blue Nun, was born and died in Ágreda, a town located in the province of Soria, Castile and León, Spain. She was the daughter of Don Francisco Coronel and his wife Catalina de Arana; all the members of her family were powerfully influenced by the ecstatic piety of Spain in that period.

Life

Her biographer, Samaniego, records that even as an infant in arms she was filled with divine knowledge. From childhood she was favored by ecstasies and visions.

When Maria was fifteen the whole family adopted the Catholic religion. The father, now an old man, and the two sons entered the Franciscan house of San Antonio de Nalda. Maria, her mother and sister established a Franciscan nunnery in the family house at Agreda, which, when Maria's reputation grew, was replaced by the building still existing. Construction of the nunnery was begun with only one hundred réis (one pound sterling) lent her by a devotee, and it was completed in fourteen years by voluntary gifts. The Virgin Mary was declared abbess, and Maria was appointed as her "locum tenens" at the age of twenty-five. Though the rules required the abbess to be changed every three years, Maria remained effectively in charge of Agreda until her death.

In 1668, four years after her death, the Franciscans published a story that at the age of twenty-two she had been miraculously conveyed to Mexico, to convert a native people, and had made five hundred bilocations for that purpose in one year. [This holy virgin burned with a most ardent love for God and for the salvation of souls. One day, she beheld in a vision all the nations of the world. She saw the greater part of men were deprived of God's grace, and running headlong to everlasting perdition. She saw how the Indians of Mexico put fewer obstacles to the grace of conversion than any other nation who were out of the Catholic Church, and how God, on this account, was ready to show mercy to them. Hence she redoubled her prayers and penances to obtain for them the grace of conversion. God heard her prayers. He commanded her to teach the Catholic religion to those Mexican Indians. From that time, she appeared, by way of bilocation, to the savages, not less than five hundred times, instructing them in all the truths of our holy religion, and performing miracles in confirmation of these truths. When all were converted to the faith, she told them that religious priests would be sent by God to receive them into the Church by baptism. As she had told, so it happened. God, in his mercy, sent to these good Indians several Franciscan fathers, who were greatly astonished when they found those savages fully instructed in the Catholic doctrine. When they asked the Indians who had instructed them, they were told that a holy virgin appeared among them many times, and taught them the Catholic religion and confirmed it by miracles. (Life of the Venerable Mary of Jesus of Agreda, § xii.) Thus those good Indians were brought miraculously to the knowledge of the true religion in the Catholic Church, because they followed their conscience in observing the natural law. [http://en.wikisource.org/wiki/The_Catholic_Dogma:_Extra_Ecclesiam_Nullus_Omnino_Salvatur#.C2.A7_8._HOW_ALMIGHTY_GOD_LEADS_TO_SALVATION_THOSE_WHO_ARE_INCULPABLY_IGNORANT_OF_THE_TRUTHS_OF_SALVATION. Muller, Michael. "The Catholic Dogma: "Extra Ecclesiam Nullus omnino Salvatur"] ]

In her later years she inclined to the "internal prayer," and neglect of the outward offices of the churchFact|date=June 2008, which was usual with the "alumbrados" or Quietists. The Inquisition took notice of her, but she was not proceeded against with severity.

Maria's importance in religion and Spanish history is based on two grounds.

1. In the earlier part of her life, while the Franciscan, Francisco Andres de la Torre, was her confessor, she wrote an "Introduction to the History of the Most Blessed Virgin". It was destroyed by the direction of another confessor.

2. Later on, by the order of her superiors, and under the guidance of her Franciscan confessor, Andres de Fuen Mayor, she wrote "The Mystical City of God" (1670), a life of the Virgin Mary ostensibly based on divine revelations granted to Maria. "The Mystical City of God" attracted considerable controversy after Croset, a French Recollect friar, translated and published the first part of her visions in 1690. It had already been condemned, and the Inquisition and Blessed Pope Innocent XI had it placed on the "Index Librorum Prohibitorum" in 1681, ostensibly for its "excessive" Marian devotion and doctrinal errors related to the Immaculate Conception, as well as accusations of scatological language. King Charles II of Spain lobbied Pope Alexander VIII on her behalf, but succeeded only in having the ban suspended in Spain.

However, due to prompting from her Spanish admirers, the Vatican re-examined the case in 1729, under Pope Benedict XIII. After reassessment by the Universities of Salamanca, Alcala, Toulouse and Louvain, Pope Benedict XIV ordered that the ban should be lifted in 1748.

In 1673, Pope Clement X declared Sister María de Jesús de Ágreda as venerable.

Her Incorruptibility

An additional mystery associated with the Abbess of Agreda is identified in popular literature. The physical body of the nun is said to be incorruptible; not subject to rot and decay like normal living creature are after their death. "Even in death, Sister Agreda defies the rationalists and supplies non-believers and the faithful with evidence of her fantastic talents. In a secluded crypt on the grounds of the convent we find...Sister Marie Jesus Agreda's body, [which] it turns out, is incorruptible. Like a small number of deceased mystics and Catholic saints, the nun's body refuses to naturally decay, even after 335 long years. The flush of her cheeks and her life-like features still baffle the Catholic Church and modern science. During an opening of her casket in 1909, a cursory scientific examination was performed on the pristine body in peaceful repose, astounding the scientists and doctors who were allowed to perform the examination. In 1989 a Spanish physician named Andreas Medina participated in another examination of Sister Maria Jesus Agreda as she lay in the convent of the Conceptionist nuns, the same monastery where she had lived in the 1600s. Dr. Medina told investigative journalist Javier Sierra in 1991: "'What most surprised me about that case is that when we compared the state of the body, as it was described in the medical report from 1909, with how it appeared in 1989, we realized it had absolutely not deteriorated at all in the last eighty years.'" [ [http://shell.amigo.net/~tmv/Special_Inv4.html The Blue Nun ] ]

Purportedly, complete photographic and other evidence was obtained by investigators before her casket was re-sealed. Although the process of beatification was opened in 1673 it has not been completed as of now because of the various disputes about her writings, therefore she may be called "Venerable" but not "Blessed" according to the rules of the Catholic Church. During the 400th anniversary of her birth in 2002 renewed efforts were made to move forward the beatification process by several marian groups in the world [ [http://www.cambridgeconnections.net/Maria_Rome.html The Beatification of Sor Maria Goes to Rome ] ] .

Popular Culture

The venerable nun is featured in a work of fiction, "The Lady in Blue" ("Dama azul"), by Javier Sierra (Atria Books, 2005/07). ISBN 1-4165-3223-4

Giacomo Casanova mentions being compelled to reading Maria de Agreda's book during his imprisonment in the venice prison "i Piombi" as a means of the clergy to psychologically torture the prisoners. He argues that a captive's mind can get inflamed with such aberrant ideas to the point of madness, which was purportedly the purpose of having been given the book to read.

Bibliography

*"Life of Venerable Mary of Ágreda", by James A Carrico, Marian Press, 1959.

References

ee also

*Congregation of the Immaculate Conception

External links

* [http://www.mariadeagreda.org María de Jesús de Ágreda | Official home page of her abbey in Spain] (English and Spanish)
* [http://www.geocities.com/Athens/Ithaca/7194/index.html Online, abridged version of "The Mystical City of God"]
* [http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/01229a.htm Catholic Encyclopedia article]
* [http://www.archive.org/search.php?query=city%20of%20god%20agreda Works of María de Agreda in archive.org]
* [http://www.desertusa.com/mag08/jan08/ladyinblue.html A detailed account of Agreda's (a.k.a. The Blue Nun) appearances in 17th century America]