Katherina von Bora (Dec. 20)

 

 

Katharina von Bora 

Dec. 20, 1552

Church Reformer

 

Homily for biweekly 10:30 am Mass at the Rogue Valley Manor

 

(adapted from https://www.womenoftheelca.org/filebin/pdf/resources/KatharinaBoldLifeOfFaith.pdf)

 

Katharina von Bora Luther, called “Katie” by those she loved,  was born in the eastern German state of Saxony on January 29, 1499. Hers was a noble family, but a family without much wealth. When Katie was about five years old, her mother died, and her father sent Katie to a Benedictine convent school near Halle. When she was ten,Katie was sent to a Cistercian nunnery in  Nimbschen, where she was consecrated as a nun six years later, in 1515, when

she was 16 years old.

 

Life in the cloisters gave Katie something that most women outside the cloister did not have: the ability to read and write. Katie even learned some Latin.

 

While in the Nimbschen cloister, Katie and others somehow learned of the reforming work of Martin of Erfurt, an Augustinian monk and professor at the

University of Wittenberg whose surname was Luther. It is known that in 1519

Luther preached in Grimma, a town near Nimbschen. The nascent Reformation teachings appealed to some of the sisters. On Holy Saturday in 1523, after

the Easter Vigil, Katie and 11 other nuns secretly left the Nimbschen cloister under the dark of night. The 12 traveled to Torgau, and 9 continued on to

Wittenberg, where Luther then assisted the women in establishing new lives.

 

At that time, leaving religious life or assisting someone with leaving were offences punishable by death. Katie and the other 11 women boldly risked

their lives for freedom. Martin Luther also risked his life, as he is attributed as having facilitated the escape.

 

Katie was the last among the 12 to settle into a new life, but a new life she found on June 13, 1525, when she and Martin Luther married. This marriage

between a former monk and a former nun was quite controversial, but each of them had a strong personality and was able to stand up to the criticism

they received. Luther was called a “most insane and libidinous of apostates,” for example, and Katie a “poor, misled woman.” Commentaries and plays

were written attacking the two. “Protestant pigs” were depicted entering the church in one woodcut, “followed by the biggest pigs of all, Catharina von

Bora and Martin Luther.” Katie and Martin likely supported each other in the

face of all this criticism.

 

Katie and Martin received the former Augustinian monastery in Wittenberg known as the Black Cloister as a wedding gift, and soon Katie was managing all the household affairs. She was a frugal and shrewd entrepreneur: She raised and bred cattle. She ran a brewery. She took in students and professors as

boarders. She had several gardens, which fed both her family (in time she and Luther had six children) and the boarders. She managed the stables. Using nursing skills learned while in the cloister, Katie cared for many of the local ill. She often participated in Luther’s famous table talks and exerted a great influence on his later theology. She even assisted a call committee

in securing a new pastor, at Luther’s request.

 

Katie was a Renaissance woman, excelling in many areas. We might say there’s a bit of Katie in all of us.