St. Kinga
by Unknown
St. Kinga was born in Esztergom in 1234, the third daughter of King Bela IV of Hungary and Maria, daughter of the Byzantine Emperor Theodore I Lascaris. Kinga was given in marriage to Polish Prince Boleslaus of Sandomierz, later called the "Chaste". This political marriage was arranged when Kinga was five and Boleslaus 12. Invited by the nobles of Krakow also to take over the Principality of Krakow, Boleslaus began his governance of the two principalities in 1247. In a county destroyed by the Tartars but still Christian, Kinga became a benefactor, governing with her husband, jointly signing and sealing all documents.
Theirs was a special marriage in that Kinga convinced her husband that they should live together in virginity; thus his epithet "the Chaste". Having no desire to experience the physical joys of motherhood, Kinga became a mother to all the needy. She lived with her husband for 40 years, governing in a very difficult situation marked by the weakness of a country devastated by two Attar invasions. All her personal possessions were used to aid the poor.
When her husband died in 1279, she renounced the throne and in 1280 founded a Poor Clare monastery on land given to her by Boleslaus at Stary Sacz. She lived as a guest in the monastery for eight years, not entering it until 1288 and later becoming Prioress. She died on 24 July 1292 at the age of 58, whereupon she was widely venerated as a saint. In 1690 Pope Alexander VIII confirmed her cult, the equivalent of beatification.
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