Five years before, Francis had been wholly converted to gospel living, following the poor Jesus in complete poverty both material and spiritual. His ideals and personality so drew and inspired Clare that she sought his direction and counsel which, a year later (March 1212), resulted in her leaving home secretly with a companion, to follow St. Francis. At the Chapel of the Portiuncula around which they lived, Francis and his Brothers were keeping vigil and with lighted candles welcomed Clare. Francis cut off her hair and clothed her in a poor, simple, brown tunic, tied round the waist with a piece of rope, similar to that which his own Brothers wore, introducing her temporarily to two nearby monasteries in succession. But Clare felt that in these established places she could neither settle nor follow Francis' ideals of complete poverty. At the end of April he led her and her younger sister Agnes who had now joined her, to San Damiano, a small chapel which soon after his conversion he had helped to rebuild. Here Clare lived for forty years a life of poverty and love, with many years of continued illness, the first of the Poor Ladies, as St. Francis called them, and the beloved Mother and guide of over fifty companions in the little monastery of San Damiano.
Chiara di Favorone - 'clear-shining - light.'
She was born in 1194 in Assisi, Italy, into a rich and noble family. When she was seventeen she heard and saw St. Francis preach.
The lifelong concern of Clare was to have confirmed by the Pope himself both Francis' and her ideals of complete poverty for the Poor Ladies of San Damiano. A few days before she died, the Pope who happened to be near Assisi, visited her and granted her the permission she had lived to obtain - the privilege of complete poverty.
She died towards dawn on 11th August 1253, aged 59, and was pronounced a saint two years later. Even in her lifetime there were almost 100 monasteries dedicated to living the gospel under her and Francis' inspiration. To this day her spirit lives. There are almost 900 monasteries spread over every continent.
