St. Mary di Rosa also known by the name, St. Maria Crocifissa di Rosa, is the foundress of the Handmaids of Charity of Brescia, also called the Servants of Charity. Maria was born as Paola Francesca di Rosa to an affluent family of Brescia, Italy on November 6, 1813. Though wealthy, her family was not devoid of hardships. Her mother passed away when she was eleven. The young Paola soon realised that the cross was a part of every Christians life.
At the young age of seventeen, she organised retreats and special missions for her parish and set up a women's guild. At twenty-four, being appointed as supervisor of a workhouse for poor girls, she was taken aback by the fact that the young girls who worked there did not have a place to stay at night. She promptly quit her job and started a boarding house for poor girls while helping her brother with a school for the deaf.
In 1840, Paola founded the community, The Pious Union. The Union eventually became the religious congregation, Handmaids of Charity being approved by Pope Pius IX in 1850. She took the name Maria Crocifissa di Rosa, as a sign of the importance of the cross in Christian life.
Maria Crocifissa’s guiding motto for her order was: “Charity without limits for the sick who represent Jesus Christ.” The Handmaids of Charity’s charism to this day echoes this founding sentiment.
In 1848, her whole life seemed to fall apart when she lost her close friends Gabriela and Monsignor Pinzoni. War had started in Europe and her homeland was invaded. Paola however did not step back; rather she and her sisters served the wounded and displaced in the hospitals. She did not confine her serving just to the hospitals, she even went out to the battlefield to give spiritual and physical comfort to the wounded and dying.
Maria died at Brescia on December 15, 1855 at the age of fourty-four. She was canonized by Pope Pius XII in 1954, just a hundred years later. Her order of sisters, the Handmaids of Charity, continues to serve the poor and suffering in Italy and throughout the world.
Other Saints of the Day
1. Saint Paul of Latros
2. Caelian, Candidus, Faustinus, Fortunatus, Januarius, Lucius and Mark - Martyrs of North Africa
3. Antonius, Irenaeus, Saturnin, Theodorus and Victor - Martyrs of Rome
4. Saint Urbicius
5. Saint Christiana the Slave
Click here to read other articles in this series