Restless Hearts · Week 2 · Grades 6–8
Guided Notes: St. Clare of Assisi
- Name
- Date
- Class
Follow along as your teacher presents. Fill in each section when its slide is on the screen.
St. Clare of Assisi
A planned life, and a different choice
Clare was born in blank 1 into a noble family in Assisi, a hill town in central Italy. A daughter of such a family was expected to marry well and add to its wealth and power.
Assisi was changing. Merchants were growing rich, and the gap between rich and poor was wide. A young man of the town, Francis, had shocked everyone by giving up his inheritance to live as a poor man for blank 2.
Clare heard Francis preach and made her decision. On the night of Palm Sunday in blank 3, at about 18, she left home in secret. She went to the small chapel where Francis and his brothers waited.
Clare’s life
Write what happened in each year.
| Year | What happened |
|---|---|
| 1194 | Write your answer |
| 1212 | Write your answer |
| 1216 | Write your answer |
| 1226 | Write your answer |
| 1228 | Write your answer |
| 1253 | Write your answer |
| 1255 | Write your answer |
| 1958 | Write your answer |
Check the facts
What did Clare’s noble family expect her life to be? Circle one.
- A A life of study at a university
- B A marriage that helped the family
- C A life as a nun in a rich abbey
- D A career running the family trade
Why is that the right answer?
Holding her ground
Clare’s relatives came to take her home by force. She held on to the altar and showed them her cut hair, the sign that she had given her life to blank 4. They gave up. Soon her sister Agnes joined her.
The women settled at San Damiano, a small church outside Assisi. They lived enclosed, which means they stayed inside the blank 5, and spent their days in prayer, silence and manual work.
Most convents then owned land that paid their bills. Clare wanted none. Church leaders, including popes, urged her to accept blank 6 for safety. She respectfully refused, again and again, for decades.
Why poverty?
Why did Clare insist that her community own no property? Circle one.
- A She believed money and land were evil things
- B Her family had taken away her inheritance
- C She wanted to rely on God as the poor Christ did
- D The Pope ordered all convents to be poor
Why is that the right answer?
History or tradition?
Some things about Clare are recorded facts. Others are stories handed down by people who knew and loved her. Sort each one. Check one box for each.
| Item | Recorded history | Story handed down |
|---|---|---|
| Clare was born in Assisi in 1194 | ||
| She saw Christmas Mass on the wall of her room | ||
| A pope approved her rule two days before she died | ||
| Attacking soldiers fled when she prayed before the Eucharist | ||
| Pius XII named her patron of television in 1958 | ||
| She was canonized in 1255 |
Illness, attention and a strange patronage
Clare was sick for much of her adult life and often could not leave her bed. She kept leading the sisters and kept praying.
A famous story tells that in 1240 soldiers climbed the walls of San Damiano. Clare had the Eucharist, the blank 7 of Christ, carried to the door and prayed. The soldiers left. This is why art often shows her holding the Eucharist.
Tradition also says that one blank 8, too ill to attend Mass, she saw and heard it on the wall of her room. In 1958 Pope Pius XII named her patron of television for that reason.
Virtues Clare lived
For each virtue, write how the saint lived it.
| Virtue | How the saint lived it |
|---|---|
| Poverty of spirit | Write your answer |
| Perseverance | Write your answer |
| Recollection | Write your answer |
A first in Church history
What is Clare known as the first woman to do? Circle one.
- A Write a rule of religious life approved by a pope
- B Be canonized as a saint by a pope in Rome
- C Start a convent for women anywhere in Italy
- D Preach in public alongside Francis of Assisi
Why is that the right answer?
Talk it over
Clare chose silence and owned nothing so that her attention belonged to Christ. Your attention is something apps, games and feeds compete for all day. What gets most of your attention, and what would you change if you guarded it the way Clare did?
Think: my idea before we talk
Sentence starters: “The thing that takes most of my attention is ...”“One time of day I could keep silent and screen-free is ...”“Something I would notice more if I looked up is ...”“The hardest part of silence for me is ...”
Pair: something my partner said
Let us pray
Lord Jesus, you became poor for our sake.
Free us from what we cling to, and quiet our hearts.
Guide what we look at and what we love.
St. Clare of Assisi, pray for us.
Amen.
My own prayer or intention:
Well done!
Clare’s sisters, the Poor Clares, still live her rule around the world. Her feast day is August 11.
One thing I learned today:
One question I still have:
How could the example of St. Clare of Assisi shape the way I live, online and offline?
Challenge: Choose one of the three virtue practices and keep it every day until next week’s saint.