The Chronology of the Instructiones of St. Angela of Foligno

Abstract

Angela of Foligno was certainly born in the middle of the 13th century, in a rich family. Most scholars accept, at least to a certain extent, a more exact chronology of her life, proposed by Martin-Jean Ferré.1 According to him, Angela, born in 1248, experienced a conversion in 1285 and lost her entire family – husband, children, and mother – in a few subsequent years. In this time she also sold all of her possessions. At the beginning of 1291 she entered the Third Order of St. Francis and went on a pilgrimage to Assisi, during which she experienced powerful mystical graces, hearing the voice of the Holy Spirit and conversing with him almost the whole way. During her stay in Assisi, she caused a scandal, screaming in the basilica of St. Francis, when the divine presence withdrew from her soul, and (unexpectedly, but fortunately) drawing the attention of her relative, Franciscan friar to which the Liber refers as “brother A.” He first reacted with outrage and forbade her to return to Assisi ever again, but then, having come back to Foligno, reached out to her in an attempt to understand what had happened in the basilica. When he began to learn more about her spiritual life, he became her secretary, working together with her on what later was to become Memoriale, the first part of the Liber. As the years went by, Angela became a spiritual “mother” not only to brother A., but also to a circle of Franciscans to whom the Liber refers as her “sons” and who played a crucial role in the creating of it. She died surrounded by them on the 4th of January 1309 in Foligno and the local devotion led eventually to her beatification (without a formal process) in 1701 by pope Clement IX and, finally, to her canonization (again, without a process) in 2013 by pope Francis. The documents collected in the