Longing for God - Purgatory as Paradigm in Santa Maria Maddalena de’ Pazzi (1566-1607)

Abstract

On 14th June 1587, Alamanno de’ Pazzi, brother of Maria Maddalena de’ Pazzi and commander of Tuscany’s military forces died.  During this time the Carmelite mystic was passing from her own spiritual battle, journeying through a period of spiritual desolation  which began on 16th June 1585 and which will only come to an end five years later, on 10th June 1590. We know almost nothing about  the first two years of this spiritual desolation period, described by the saint as the lion’s den (il lago dei leoni). The saint, on  discovering certain journals containing accounts of her tribulations compiled by Sister Costanza Morelli, “without even bothering to  read them, she secretly threw them all in fire and burnt them”. However, Mother Vangelista del Giocondo commissioned Sister Maria  Pacifica del Tovaglia to rewrite whatever she remembered of the past two years and subsequently to give an account of the future  happenings.