Originally published at Catholic News Agency
On Nov. 16, the Catholic Church celebrates the memory of a distinguished medieval nun and writer in the Benedictine monastic tradition, Saint Gertrude of Helfta, better known as “St. Gertrude the Great.”
One of the most esteemed woman saints of the Christian West, she was a notable early devotee of the Sacred Heart of Jesus.
“She was an exceptional woman, endowed with special natural talents and extraordinary gifts of grace, the most profound humility and ardent zeal for her neighbor’s salvation,” Pope Benedict XVI said of St. Gertrude in an October 2010 general audience.
“She was in close communion with God both in contemplation and in her readiness to go to the help of those in need.”
Born in Germany on Jan. 6, 1256, Gertrude was sent at age 5 to a monastery in Helfta, to receive her education and religious formation. Under the leadership of the abbess Gertrude of Hackeborn, the monastery was highly regarded for its spiritual and intellectual vitality. The young Gertrude’s teacher, later canonized in her own right, was the abbess’ sister Saint Matilda of Hackeborn.
A gifted student with a great thirst for knowledge, Gertrude excelled in her study of the arts and sciences of her day, while living according
