Margaret of Hungary

At the Dominican convent on the Danube island, Margaret embraced a life of rigorous asceticism and voluntary poverty. Although a princess, she refused the honors due to her rank and chose the humblest tasks of the community: cooking, laundry, and caring for sick sisters. Several sources report that she imposed bodily mortifications upon herself, voluntarily depriving herself of food and rest and dedicating long hours to prayer. She was distinguished by an intense devotion to the Eucharist and to the crucified Christ. Her charity toward the poor was remarkable: she distributed to the needy the gifts that her royal family sent her. The testimonies collected after her death describe her as living in total humility, seeking peace within her community and tirelessly performing the most repulsive services. It was in this daily fidelity to the Dominican rule, rather than in external works, that her entire consecrated existence unfolded.

Margaret's spirituality is rooted in a literal imitation of the poor and crucified Christ. Renouncing the privileges of her royal birth, she made humility and penance the heart of her life. Hagiographic accounts insist on her detachment from honors, her obedience, and her zeal for the most despised tasks of the convent. Her reputation for holiness spread during her lifetime and was affirmed immediately after her death: according to tradition, a sweet fragrance emanated from her body, and her tomb quickly became a place of pilgrimage. In the years following her passing, events considered miraculous were reported there, testifying to the popular veneration she was the object of very early on. This fame of holiness, founded on the austerity of her life and the charity of her service, constituted the foundation of her cult and led, through the centuries, to the processes for her official recognition by the Church.

The process for the recognition of Margaret's sanctity began shortly after her death. Investigations conducted between 1271 and 1276, at the initiative of her family, gathered testimonies relating to her life and her intercession: according to several sources, seventy-four miracles were attributed to her at that time. The procedure, however, remained unfinished and was resumed without success on several occasions, notably in the 17th and 18th centuries. Her veneration as blessed was finally confirmed by Pope Pius VI on July 28, 1789. It was not until Pope Pius XII that she was canonized: on November 19, 1943, he officially recognized her sanctity through an equivalent canonization, an exceptional procedure based not on new miracles but on the immemorial veneration she enjoyed. Her liturgical feast is celebrated on January 18, the anniversary of her death.

Margaret of Hungary remains one of the great figures of Dominican sanctity and one of the patron saints of Hungary. The island on the Danube where she spent the majority of her monastic life, formerly called the Island of Hares, today bears her name: Margaret Island (Margit-sziget), in the heart of Budapest, where the ruins of the Dominican convent still remain. After the suppression of the monastery at the end of the 18th century, her relics were dispersed and preserved in various places, notably in Esztergom, Győr, and Pannonhalma. Her legend was the subject of a rich Dominican hagiographic tradition, studied by historians up to the contemporary era. A member of a family that included several saints, including her aunt Saint Elizabeth of Hungary, Margaret embodies the ideal of a princess who renounced the world for the service of God and the poor. Her example of radical humility and penance continues to inspire the Dominican Order and popular devotion in Hungary.