Observations placeholder
Passitea Crogi - At Santa Fiora in the house of the Duchess Sforza, she remained raised from the ground at the height of a man
Identifier
024221
Type of Spiritual Experience
Background
Friar Herbert Thurston was a Catholic priest, a member of the Jesuit order and an historian. He wrote extensively on Catholic mysticism and psychic phenomena and was a member of the Society for Psychical Research. He was also widely read on this subject. He is described as ‘an honest skeptic’., and once said ‘the role of Devil’s advocate is a thankless one and does not make for popularity’.
A description of the experience
Friar Herbert Thurston - The Physical Phenomenon of Mysticism
Passitea Crogi was a Sienese Capuchin nun who died in 1615; her biographer, a learned professor of Arabic, who manifests a quite unusual sense of the value of evidence, writes as follows:
According to the violence of the ecstasy she was lifted more or less from the ground. Sister Felice deposed that she had seen her raised three braccia. Sister Maria Francesca more than four braccia and at the same time that she was completely surrounded with an immense effulgence of light. This lasted for two or three hours.
On one occasion at Santa Fiora in the house of the Duchess Sforza, when she was present with a crowd of other people, Passitea was surprised by a rapture, under the influence of which she remained raised from the ground at the height of a man. The Duchess, who was a witness of the occurrence, caused an attestation of the fact to be drawn up, which was signed by all present.
We are also told that she was often transported from place to place without moving her feet and without touching the ground. Thus in an expedition she undertook with Suor Diodata on a muddy day, when the latter was covered with mire Passitea reached her journey's end without a speck.