St. Colette: Walled in but not abandoned

St. Colette of Corbie was born in 1381 to parents who had long given up hope. Her mother, Marguerite, and her father, Robert, who was a carpenter at a Benedictine abbey, had prayed for a child for decades. They had watched their peers raise children and grandchildren while their own cradle remained empty.

Finally, after a lifetime of waiting, their prayers were answered through the intercession of St. Nicholas. Marguerite was 60 years old when she conceived. They named their daughter Nicolette in his honor, though she would become known to the world as Colette. It is a beautiful story.

When we hear of a woman conceiving at 60 years of age, it's easy to stop reading there. The miracle becomes the whole story, and we miss everything that came after. But St. Colette's life didn't end at her birth; it began there. And if we reduce her to the answer her parents received, we rob ourselves of the witness she offers: a life that shows us what fruitfulness looks like.

Faithfulness without certainty 

St. Colette's life didn't begin with clarity; it began with confusion.

From the age of 9, she experienced visions. But instead of immediate certainty, she spent years wandering through different religious communities, trying to discern where she belonged. She tried the Beguines. She tried the Benedictines. She tried the Urbanist Poor Clares. None of them felt right.

When her parents died and she was orphaned at 17, she made a radical choice: she became a recluse, walled into a small cell attached to the church in Corbie. This wasn't simply a period of solitude or retreat; in the medieval tradition of anchoresses, she was literally enclosed, sealed into that space with no intention of leaving. 

The cell became the entire boundary of her physical world. She would receive Communion and her daily needs through a small opening. She could receive visitors, but only through a grate. After a while, however, she received no more visitors and, for three years, maintained complete silence and seclusion. She wrote of this time as rich in both grace and suffering. 

For four years, from 1402 to 1406, she lived in that confined space, sewing vestments and clothes for the poor and praying through her doubts. She had visions calling her to reform the Poor Clares and wrestled with whether she was being deceived. She battled doubts she initially mistook for demonic. The call felt real, but the path forward was anything but clear.

During those years of enclosure, Colette learned something essential: faithfulness doesn't require certainty. She didn't have a roadmap. She didn't have confirmation that her visions were authentic. What she had was a willingness to stay present to God in the confusion.

To the outside world, her life might have looked small, contained and barren, but in that place of solitude and prayer, God was preparing her to give birth to a movement.

It was after those years of patient waiting that St. Francis himself appeared to her in a vision and confirmed her call to reform. The clarity came, but only after she had learned to be faithful in the face of uncertainty. 

For those of us navigating infertility, Colette's early years offer a different kind of hope. We don't need to have it all figured out. We don't need to know how the story ends. What we need is the courage to remain present to God in the uncertainty, trusting that even when we can't see the path forward, He is still at work.

And God was at work. When Colette finally emerged from that cell, the fruitfulness He had been preparing became visible to the world.

Mothering without bearing

While Colette's birth was a miracle of biological life, her own life became a testament to a different kind of fruitfulness. Colette did not marry or have children of her own. Instead, she followed a call to religious life, eventually becoming a reformer of the Poor Clares. At a time when the order had become lax and comfortable, Colette felt called to restore its original self-denial and poverty. It wasn't easy. She faced opposition, slander and rejection. Colette went on to found 17 new convents and reform many others. She became a spiritual mother to hundreds of women, breathing new life into a dying order. 

God confirmed her mission through extraordinary signs: she healed the sick, raised stillborn babies to life by placing her veil or habit on them, and her prayers were credited with assisting a woman through dangerous labor. The same woman who never bore a child became an instrument through which God brought forth life in the most literal and miraculous ways. Her "yes" to God brought forth a harvest that is still bearing fruit today.

This is a vital truth for us to hold onto. Infertility can make us feel broken, as if our bodies are failing at their primary purpose. It can make us feel walled in and separated from the world around us. St. Colette reminds us that our capacity to nurture, to create, to love, and to bring life into the world isn’t limited by our biology. Whether through adoption, fostering, mentoring, creative work, or simply loving the people right in front of us, we are called to be fruitful now. We do not have to wait to become a mother to begin mothering those around us.

Strength without standing

One of the most touching details of St. Colette’s life is that she was born small and physically fragile. She remained small in stature throughout her life, yet she possessed a spiritual strength that moved mountains.

There are days on this journey when we feel small. The grief of another negative test, the sting of a baby announcement, or the sheer exhaustion of hope deferred can leave us feeling too weak to stand.

On those days, we don’t have to carry the burden alone. We can call on those who have gone before us. St. Colette is a powerful intercessor for couples hoping to conceive. 

On March 6, her feast day, I invite you to light a candle and ask St. Colette to pray for you. We can ask for the miracle of a child, yes. But we can also ask for the strength to be fruitful in our current season, however that looks. 

We may feel walled in, but we are never abandoned.