BL. SATURNINA RODRIGUEZ DE ZAVALIA, FOUNDRESS - 5 APRIL

 

ALL SAINTS CELEBRATED IN APRIL

Saints celebrated on the 5th 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.

BL. SATURNINA RODRIGUEZ DE ZAVALIA, FOUNDRESS 

Blessed Saturnina Rodriguez de Zavalia, who took the name Catalina de Maria in religious life, was born in Cordoba, Argentina in 1823. Her mother died when she was three, and her father when she was nine. Thereafter she was cared for by her aunts.

THE SPIRITUAL EXERCISES OF ST IGNATIUS OF LOYOLA

She did the Spiritual Exercises of St Ignatius at age 17 and felt a call to an active religious life, but in Argentina at the time, there were only contemplative orders of women.

She dedicated herself to promoting the spiritual exercises and got married. After her husband's death in 1865, her desire to enter religious life re-emerged, as she was adoring the Blessed Sacrament. She was inspired to  form a community serving following the rule of St Ignatius Loyola and forming vulnerable women with its spirituality.

THE SLAVES OF THE HEART OF JESUS

On September 29, 1872, she founded the Slaves of the Heart of Jesus, the first congregation of apostolic life in Argentina. The order spread across Argentina, and is today also present in Chile, Spain, and Benin.

Mother Catalina de Maria worked during her religious life with Bl. Jose Gabriel del Rosario Brochero, the "Gaucho priest", sending 16 sisters of her congregation to a school he had founded. 

She died April 5, 1896 at the motherhouse of her congregation.

(For the full article please see

https://www.catholicnewsagency.com/news/35294/this-argentine-nuns-cause-for-beatification-is-advancing)