Overview
- The Catholic Church observes Saint Clare’s feast on August 11, a day when newspapers republish her traditional biography and prayer for public devotion.
- Born Chiara Scifi in Assisi in 1194, she left a noble household after hearing Francis of Assisi and entered religious life, renouncing her possessions in 1212.
- She founded the Order of the Poor Ladies, known as the Poor Clares, which established a life of cloistered prayer and service under Franciscan influence.
- Traditional hagiography credits her with miracles such as the multiplication of bread and a miraculous vision of Mass while ill, accounts that underpin popular veneration.
- Pope Pius XII declared her patroness of television in 1958, a designation often cited in modern remembrances alongside other patronages like protection for eye illnesses.