The Memorial of Saint Elizabeth of Hungary

Today the Church keeps memory of Saint Elizabeth of Hungary, who was known for her great love and care for the poor. Elizabeth was born in 1207, the daughter of King Andrew of Hungary. At the age of 13, she married Prince Louis of Thuringia ( a German principality), with whom she was very much in love. Elizabeth soon took up the work of caring for the sick and supplying for the needs of the poor. She was also devoted to prayer and meditation. Elizabeth and Louis had three children together, but after only six years of marriage, Louis died in the Crusades. Elizabeth was heartbroken.

Her husband's family looked upon her almsgiving as squandering the royal purse, so they opposed her charitable work and mistreated her. The tension between the royal family and Elizabeth reached a point where they actually threw her out of the palace. Fortunately for Elizabeth, Louis' allies soon returned from the Crusades and had her reinstated, since her son was the legal heir to Louis' throne.

Elizabeth's devotion to the cause of the poor and the sick continued to deepen. She joined the Secular Franciscan Order in 1228 and soon founded a hospital, where she spent the remaining years of her life serving the sick. Eventually, Elizabeth sold literally all that she had and worked tirelessly on behalf of the neediest in society. Elizabeth died of natural causes in 1231 at Marburg and, as a consequence of her enormous popularity, was canonized four short years later, on May 31, 1235 by Pope Gregory IX.

The second reading from today's Office is taken from a letter by Conrad of Marburg, who was the spiritual director of Saint Elizabeth of Hungary.

Elizabeth was a lifelong friend of the poor and gave herself entirely to relieving the hungry. She ordered that one of her castle should be converted into a hospital in which she gathered many of the weak and feeble. She generously gave alms to all who were in need, not only in that place but in all the territories of her husband's empire. She spent all her own revenue from her husband's four principalities, and finally she sold her luxurious possessions and rich clothes for the sake of the poor.

Twice a day, in the morning and in the evening, Elizabeth went to visit the sick. She personally cared for those who were particularly repulsive; to some she gave good, to others clothing; some she carried on her own shoulders, and performed many other kindly services. Her husband, of happy memory, gladly approved of these charitable works. Finally, when her husband died, she sought the highest perfection; filled with tears, she implored me to let her beg for alms from door to door.

On Good Friday of that year, when the altars had been stripped, she laid her hands on the altar in a chapel in her own town, where she had established the Friars Minor, and before witnesses she voluntarily renounced all worldly display and everything that our Savior in the gospel advises us to abandon. Even then she saw that she could still be distracted by the cares and worldly glory which had surrounded her while her husband was alive. Against my will she followed me to Marburg. Here in the town she built a hospice where she gathered together the weak and the feeble. There she attended the most wretched and contemptible at her own table.

Apart from those active good works, I declare before God that I have seldom seen a more contemplative woman.

Before her death I heard her confession. When I asked what should be done about her goods and possessions, she replied that anything which seemed to be hers belonged to the poor. She asked me to distribute everything except one worn-out dress in which she wished to be buried. When all this had been decided, she received the body of our Lord. Afterward, until vespers, she spoke often of the holiest things she had heard in sermons. Then, she devoutly commended to God all who were sitting near her, and as if falling into a gentle sleep, she died.