| Virgin and Martyr | |
|---|---|
| Born | October 16, 1890, Corinaldo, Province of Ancona, Marche, Kingdom of Italy |
| Died | July 6, 1902 (aged 11), Nettuno, Province of Rome, Lazio, Kingdom of Italy |
| Venerated in | Roman Catholic Church |
| Beatified | April 27, 1947[1], Rome by Pope Pius XII |
| Canonized | June 24, 1950, Rome by Pope Pius XII |
| Major shrine | Nettuno, Province of Rome, Lazio, Italy |
| Feast | July 6 |
| Attributes | Fourteen lilies; farmer's clothing; (occasionally) a knife |
| Patronage | Crime victims, teenage girls, modern youth, Children of Mary |
Maria Goretti (16 October 1890 – 6 July 1902) is an Italian virgin-martyr of the Catholic Church, and is one of its youngest canonized saints. She was martyred after dying from multiple stab wounds, inflicted by her attempted rapist after she refused him because of love of Jesus and her loyalty to the Ten Commandments.[2]
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[edit] Biography
[edit] Early life
Goretti was born "Maria Teresa Goretti"[3] on 16 October 1890 in Corinaldo, in the Province of Ancona, then in the Kingdom of Italy. She was the third out of six children. [4] By the time she was six, her family had become so poor that they were forced to give up their farm, move, and work for other farmers. Soon, Maria's father Luigi became very sick, and died when Maria was nine.[5] While her brother, mother and sisters worked in the fields, Maria would cook, sew, and keep the house clean. It was a hard life, but the family was very close. They shared a deep love for God and the faith. She and her family moved to Le Ferriere, near modern Latina and Nettuno in Lazio, where they lived in a building, "La Cascina Antica", they shared with another family, the Serenellis.[6]
[edit] Maria's martyrdom
On 5 July 1902, finding eleven-year old Maria alone sewing, Alessandro Serenelli came in and threatened her with death if she did not do as he said; he was intending to rape her. She would not submit, however, protesting that what he wanted to do was a mortal sin and warning Alessandro that he would go to Hell.[7]She desperately fought to stop Alessandro, a 20 year old, from abusing her. She kept screaming, "No! It is a sin! God does not want it!" Alessandro at first choked Maria, but when she insisted she would rather die than submit to him, he stabbed her eleven times. The injured Maria tried to reach for the door, but Alessandro stopped her by stabbing her three more times before running away.[8]
Maria's little sister Teresa awoke with the noise and started crying, and when Serenelli's father and Maria's mother came to check on the little girl, they found the bleeding Maria and took her to the nearest hospital in Nettuno. She underwent surgery without anesthesia, but her injuries were beyond the doctors' help. Halfway throughout the surgery, Maria woke up. She insisted that it stay that way. The pharmacist of the hospital in which she died said to her, "Maria, think of me in Paradise." She looked to the old man: "Well, who knows, which of us is going to be there first?" "You, Maria," he replied. "Then I will gladly think of you," said Maria.[9] The following day, twenty hours after the attack, having expressed forgiveness for her murderer and stating that she wanted to have him in Heaven with her, Maria died of her injuries.
[edit] Serenelli's imprisonment and repentance
Alessandro Serenelli was captured shortly after Maria's death. Originally, he was going to be sentenced to life, but since he was a minor at that time the sentence was commuted for 30 years in prison. He remained unrepentant and uncommunicative from the world for three years, until a local bishop, Monsignor Giovanni Blandini visited him in jail. Serenelli wrote a thank you note to the Bishop asking for his prayers and telling him about a dream, "in which Maria Goretti gave him lilies, which burned immediately in his hands."[10]
After his release, Alessandro Serenelli visited Maria's still-living mother, Assunta, and begged her forgiveness. She forgave him, saying that if Maria had forgiven him on her deathbed then she couldn't do less, and they attended Mass together the next day, receiving Holy Communion side by side.[11] Alessandro reportedly prayed every day to Maria Goretti and referred to her as "my little saint."[12]
Serenelli later became a laybrother of the Order of Friars Minor Capuchin, living in a convent and working as its receptionist and gardener, until dying peacefully in the year 1970.
[edit] Beatification and canonization
On the evening of the beatification ceremonies in the Basilica of Saint Peter, 27 April 1947, Pope Pius XII walked over to Assunta. She almost fainted. "When I saw the Pope coming, I prayed, Madonna, please help me. He put his hand on my head and said, blessed mother, happy mother, mother of a Blessed!" They both had eyes wet with tears.[13]
Three years later, on 24 June 1950, Pius XII canonized Goretti as a saint, the "Saint Agnes of the 20th century."[14] Assunta was again present at the ceremony, along with her four remaining sons and daughters. She was the first mother ever to attend the canonization ceremony of her child. Alessandro Serenelli was also present at the canonization.[15] [16] [17]
Owing to the huge crowd present, the ceremonies associated with the canonization were held outside of St Peter's Basilica, in the Piazza San Pietro. Pius XII spoke, not as before in Latin, but in Italian. "We order and declare, that the blessed Maria Goretti can be venerated as a Saint and We introduce her into the Canon of Saints." Some 500,000 people, among them a majority of youth, had come from around the World. Pius asked them: "Young people, pleasure of the eyes of Jesus, are you determined to resist any attack on your chastity with the help of grace of God?" A resounding "yes" was the answer.[18]
[edit] Feast day
Goretti's feast day, celebrated on 6 July, was inserted in the Roman Catholic calendar of saints for the first time when it was revised in 1969. Maria is the patron saint of chastity, rape victims, youth, teenage girls, poverty, purity and forgiveness. [19]
[edit] In art
Goretti is represented in art as a wavy-haired young girl in farmer clothes or a white dress, with a bouquet of lilies in her hands, and she is sometimes counted among the ranks of the Passionist order since her spiritual formation was guided by the Passionists.
[edit] Controversy
Some members of the feminist movement have criticized the veneration of Maria Goretti and other "martyrs of chastity", on the grounds that the Church reinforces misogyny, sexism, and physical/psychological violence against women by supporting the "better dead than raped" adage. According to some feminists, this phenomenon as a whole shows how rape is both "eroticized and normalized in patriarchy."[20] [21]
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