BL. MARIA SAGHEDDU, VIRGIN - 23 APRIL

 

ALL SAINTS CELEBRATED IN APRIL

Saints celebrated on the 23rd of April

Prayer to the Angels and the Saints

Heavenly Father, in praising Your Angels and Saints we praise Your glory, for by honouring them we honour You, their Creator. Their splendour shows us Your greatness, which infinitely surpasses that of all creation.

In Your loving providence, You saw fit to send Your Angels to watch over us. Grant that we may always be under their protection and one day enjoy their company in heaven.

Heavenly Father, You are glorified in Your Saints, for their glory is the crowning of Your gifts. You provide an example for us by their lives on earth, You give us their friendship by our communion with them, You grant us strength and protection through their prayer for the Church, and You spur us on to victory over evil and the prize of eternal glory by this great company of witnesses.

Grant that we who aspire to take part in their joy may be filled with the Spirit that blessed their lives, so that, after sharing their faith on earth, we may also experience their peace in heaven. Amen.

BLESSED MARIA SAGHEDDU, VIRGIN 

Blessed Maria Sagheddu was born in Dorgali, Sardinia, on March 17, 1914, into a family of shepherds. After having been part of the Catholic Action, she joined the Trappists of Grottaferrata (Rome). 

SHE JOINED THE TRAPPISTS

Her religious life lasted only three and a half years. Her life was offered for Christian unity. The abbess, in fact, was sensitive to the subject and - at the request of the French priest Paul Couturier, one of the first standard bearers of ecumenism - she presented to the cloistered a request for prayers and offerings so that the desire of Jesus ("that they may be one") would come true. 

PRAYERS AND SACRIFICE FOR CHRISTIAN UNITY

Gabriella died of tuberculosis on April 23, 1939. She rests in the monastery of Vitorchiano (Viterbo). John Paul II beatified her in 1983, at the end of the octave for Christian unity. 

HER ENTRY IN THE ROMAN MARTYROLOGY:

In the Cistercian monastery of Grottaferrata in the territory of Frascati near Rome, Blessed Maria Gabriella Sagheddu, a virgin, who in all simplicity offered her life, which ended at the age of twenty-five, for Christian unity.

(From: Santi e beati -

http://www.santiebeati.it/dettaglio/50475)