Which 14th-century mystic helped persuade Pope Gregory XI to return from Avignon to Rome?

Which 14th-century mystic helped persuade Pope Gregory XI to return from Avignon to Rome? Catherine of Siena did.

Catherine (1347–1380), a Dominican tertiary from Siena, became an unusually influential religious adviser despite never holding ecclesiastical office. Through letters and personal appeals, she urged Gregory XI to reform the clergy, restore peace in Italy, and bring the papacy back to Rome.

In 1376, Catherine traveled to Avignon as part of a Florentine diplomatic mission. She met Gregory there and pressed the case for Rome, where the papacy had been based before the Avignon Papacy began in 1309. Gregory returned to Rome in January 1377, though historians debate how much Catherine personally influenced his decision; political and strategic pressures also mattered.

A common mix-up is confusing Catherine with Bridget of Sweden, another prominent 14th-century female saint who also criticized the Avignon papacy. Catherine was later declared a Doctor of the Church in 1970, one of only four women to receive that title.