In the Sanctuary you can find the oratory of the crucifix, where the Crucifix of the Stigmata is kept. Tradition states that this church had been built on the garden of Catherine’s family on a plot of land adjacent to the church of Saint Antonio. It was consecrated on April 23 1623 by the Archbishop Alessandro Petrucci. The church-oratory was built to keep this crucifix, of the Pisan School, in the 12th century, which gave the stigmata to Saint Catherine in Pisa in the church of Saint Christina on the first of April 1375. This is what the saint told her confessor Raimondo da Capua: “Know now father, that through benevolence of the Lord, I already carry in my body his stigmata… I saw the Lord impaled on the cross, which came towards me in a great light and the force of my soul was so great, longing to go to the Creator, that the body was forced to rise. Then from the scars of his most holy sores, I saw five bloodied beams come down directly to my hands, feet and heart. Suddenly I exclaimed, “Oh Lord, My God: I beg of you: do not let these scars appear on the outside of my body. Whilst I was saying this, before the beams reached me, they changed their bloodied colour to a brilliant shine.” (Maoir Legend, 195 - ed. Cantagalli). The crucifix was transported to Siena in 1565 after various vicissitudes and was placed in the oratory of the kitchen where it remained until l623, the year of the construction of the church in which it was then placed.

Sources: caterinati.org