St. Angela Merici was born on March 21, around the year 1474 in a little town of Desenzano, on the South Western shore of Lake Garda, Italy. Her parents, Giovanni Merici and Biancosa Biancosi were of modest means. Angela's early days were spent on the farm owned by her father.

Vision of St. Angela

She was the first woman to found the first Religious Order of Consecrated Women. As a young woman she had an ecstatic vision. She beheld in the sky a Jacob's lader upon which virgins holding lilies ascended and descended. She saw pairs of angels and young maidens, coming down the ladder singing. Then she heard a voice which told her that one day she would found a new Congregation of Women in the town of Brescia.

Angela as a Franciscan Tertiary

Tragedy struck her life at an early age. She lost both her parents and her elder sister died suddenly. Being orphaned, she went to live with her maternal uncle at Salo. At Salo, Angela became a Franciscan Tertiary (a member of the Third Order of Saint Francis). The tertiaries were the lay helpers of the Franciscans. They had the opportunity to attend Mass and receive Holy Communion frequently, also to spend some extra time for prayer, visiting and caring for the sick, directing the youth, having an apostolate among families and friends, undertaking pilgrimages to the Holy places etc.

Angela becomes blind but recovers her eye-sight miraculously

After her uncle's death, she returned to Desenzano. In 1516 at the age of 40, the Lord led Angela to the town of Brescia. In 1524, she had an opportunity of going to the Holy Land with Bartolomeo Biancosi, her first cousin, sailing under the protection of Antonio Romano. They had travelled as far as Candia (Crete) when Angela was suddenly overtaken with blindness. She continued the journey together with the pilgrims, visited the holy places in Palestine with as much devotion as if she could have beheld them with her bodily eyes. On her return journey, as she was praying before a crucifix, her sight was restored in the very place, where she had lost it a few weeks previously.

Angela founds the Company of St. Ursula

By 1530, Angela gathered around her a group of women who cared for the sick and needy and reached out to teach young girls, the fundamentals of the Catholic Faith. Her plan was based on having a group of women who would live the religious life in their own homes. They were to be concerned with providing for the people's physical, moral and spiritual needs and restoration of family values. They were to make no perpetual vows, have no convent and wear no religious habit. During these days, she began to formulate in her mind a Rule that would unite her company into a "Religious Order".

Angela chose to place this Group under the Patronage of Saint Ursula, a Legendary Third Century British Princess martyred at Cologne with a retinue of young women. She was a virgin of the early Church, consecrated to God and led other maidens to Him. The story of Ursula and her Virgin Companions was extremely popular in the Middle Ages, and she was considered the Patroness of young women.

About the year 1533, Angela seems to have begun to train a select few of her Companions in a kind of Informal Novitiate. Twelve of them came to live with her in a house near the Church of St. Afra, but the greater number continued to live with parents or other relatives. On November 25, 1535, twenty eight young women attended Mass at the Church of St. Afra and consecrated themselves with her to the service of God. Angela and the twenty eight Companions recorded their names in a book and thus the "Company of Saint Ursula" was born. The "Company of Saint Ursula" was officially approved by the Bishop of Brescia, Francesco Cornaro as a Religious Order.

Primitive Rules of the Religious Order

The Primitive Rules she drew recommended a simple life, loving God and living a life service. During the first year, more than 150 young girls joined the Company. On August 8, 1536, Angela obtained the first ecclesiastical approbation of her Rule given by Msgr. Lorenzo Muzio, Vicar General of Cardinal Cornaro, the then Bishop of Brescia.

Each one in the Company was to continue living in her own home, exercising her apostolate among the members of her own family, her social acquaintances and the children of her neighbourhood. The Sisters were not enclosed, nor did they have a community life. They met together for classes and worship and carried out such duties as were allotted to them, and led a holy life in the midst of their families. No formal vows were taken, but the Primitive Rule drawn up by Angela prescribed the practice of Virginity, Poverty and Obedience.

Angela's death and canonization

Angela's health gradually began to fail and she grew weaker. Yet she continued her life of prayer and penance. She was taken ill early in January 1540 and died on January 27, 1540. Her lying in state lasted 30 days. Hundreds came to pay their respects. A cult to Angela grew up in an around Brescia.

In 1544, Pope Paul III issued a Bull confirming the Company of Saint Ursula and declaring it to be a recognized Congregation. Angela was beatified on April 30, 1768, by Pope Clement XIII, canonized by Pope Pius VII on May 24, 1807 and in 1861, her cult was extended to the Universal Church by Pope Pius IX. Her body still rests in a glass shrine in the former Saint Afra Church that later came to be known as Saint Angela Church.