Camilla Battista da Varano OSCl, (9 April 1458 – 31 May 1524),[1] from Camerino, Italy, was an Italian princess and a Poor Clare nun and abbess.

[3] When she was 10 years old Varano was so impressed with the preaching of Friars Domenico of Leonessa and Peter of Mogliano that every Friday she would meditate on the passion of Christ.

[4] One day Verano came across a booklet that contained a meditation on the Passion of Christ divided into fifteen parts (to be recited like a Rosary) and she began to read it every Friday, while on her knees before a crucifix.

She claimed that Jesus had given her 'three fragrant spring lilies': an intense hatred of the world, a heart-felt humility and a burning desire to endure evil.

Camilla resisted her father's plans so firmly that after two and a half years he restored her to liberty, for fear, as he said, of drawing upon himself divine vengeance, and gave his consent to her becoming a nun.

[6] During the Lent of 1479 Varano listened to a sermon of Observant Franciscan friar Francesco of Urbino, whom she described as "the trumpet of the Holy Spirit".

After a confession of her sins to a certain Friar Oliviero on Saturday within the Octave of Easter, 17 April 1479, she decided that she would enter the Poor Clare monastery at Urbino,[5] which was under the reform of the Strict Observance of the Order.

Her father had made arrangements with the Vicar General of the Observant Franciscans, under whose authority the Poor Clares operated, and the pope, in order to have her re-located there.

[3] One of the most significant points in Varano's spiritual life occurred then, when she had a vision lasting fifteen days of St. Clare of Assisi.

It was written as a meditation by an anonymous nun to her abbess, and it consists in Christ's presenting eight of His sorrows: the damned, the elect, his mother, Mary Magdalen, the apostles, Judas, the Jewish people, and the ingratitude of all creation.

During this period, between 27 February and 13 March 1491 she composed 'Vita Spirituale', (Spiritual Life, or her Autobiography) which was a long letter to Domenico of Leonessa (the preacher who had inspired her tears as a child).

The papal forces, led by Cesare Borgia, captured Camerino in 1502 and the Duke and three of his sons were imprisoned and then strangled, though her mother and youngest brother escaped.

Mother Battista fled the city and sought refuge in Fermo, but the local population, terrified of facing the wrath of Cesare Borgia, rejected her.

She found refuge in the village of Atri, in the Abruzzo region of the Kingdom of Naples, with the Duchess of Amalfi, Isabella Piccolomini Todeschini, staying there until 1503 when with Julius II the new pope she felt safe to return to Camerino.

Varano wrote to her brother-in-law, Muzio Colonna, to ask that he spare the inhabitants of Montecchio during his military expedition against Fermo in 1515.

[9] She wrote a letter to the Vicar General of the Observant Franciscans, Giovanni of Fano, to whom her last written work 'Trattato della Purita di cuore' was dedicated in the same year.

According to St. Alphonsus Liguori, in his "Discourse IX of the Dolors of Mary", Passino writes that Jesus Christ Himself one day, speaking to blessed Baptista Varani of Camerino, assured her that when on the cross, so great was His affliction at seeing His Mother at His feet in such bitter anguish, that compassion for her caused Him to die without consolation; so much so, that the blessed Baptista, being supernaturally enlightened as to the greatness of this suffering of Jesus, exclaimed, "O Lord, tell me no more of this Thy sorrow, for I can no longer bear it.

Saint Baptista Varani is depicted in a stained glass window in the church of St. Thomas of Canterbury, Woodford Green, Essex.