Blessed James Alberione

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HEADING IV
WOMEN'S APOSTOLATE IN THE PAST

For reasons of brevity and clarity, I shall limit myself to pointing out a group of special facts: setting aside the collective ones, most numerous and no less convincing.

[Three biblical heroines]

The first group is that one offered us by the Sacred Scriptures in the Old Testament: it is impossible to read it and not feel the truth of these words: The worthy woman is more precious than treasures brought in from the farthest ends of the world...1 And women were not yet raised to that dignity that brought her the law of perfection! In spite of this, not only in the home but also outside it that they exercised their mission: Esther, Deborah, Judith,2 are the three classic examples around which thousands of others stand as crown. - Esther, not so much for her beauty, as much as her virtues did she please the king and was raised to the throne by Ahasuerus. Haman, the king's minister, cruel and an enemy of the Israelites, had obtained a decree for the extermination of the Israelites.
Esther, warned by Mordecai, ordered penance and prayer for everyone. Then, she presented herself before the king
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and with her ways she won over his heart in such a way that he did not only free his people from a certain death but eventually sent Haman to the gallows.
The Israelites had sinned and God punished them by submitting them to the hands of Jabin, king of the Canaanites: and harsh was that oppression. But then, there lived a prophetess Deborah by name, to whom the Israelites came for counsel. She gave Barak the order of gathering 10,000 warriors, then she came to the battlefield and gave the orders to attack. The entire army of the enemy, although so many and well-armed, was defeated: Sisera himself was killed by Jael,3 another Israelite woman: the people were freed.
At another time, it is Holofernes who lays Bethulia under siege. He cuts off the aqueducts, and threatens to exterminate all the inhabitants. These get scared and they insist upon Uzziah to surrender the city.
However, Judith, illustrious widow of Manasseh, comes forward and reprimands the little faith in God and she raises the hope of everyone. Having come near the enemy camp, she is captured by the guards and led to Holofernes: she wins over his heart, receives his graces. Then, during the night, while Holofernes slept away his drunkenness, she severs his head. The following day, Holofernes' army flees hurriedly. Betulia is freed and its people, welcoming Judith, sing:
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You are the glory of Jerusalem, the surpassing joy of Israel; you are the splendid boast of our people.4

[With Jesus and the apostles]

At the beginning of Christianity, history tells us of a feminism that has nothing to envy that of the 20th century, although it has nothing advanced in it under many aspects. The Baby Jesus is presented at the temple. Beside Simeon, stands a woman who proclaims the expected Messiah: There was a prophetess, Anna... She never left the temple, but worshiped day and night with fasting and prayer. And coming forward at that very time, she gave thanks to God and spoke about the child to all who were awaiting the redemption of Jerusalem.5 Much later, Jesus converts the Samaritan woman6 and this, transformed from a sinner to an apostle, invites her village people to Jesus who would eventually believe in him. Jesus moves from city to city, from palace to palace; and the pious women7 welcome him, serve him, and invite the people to him. Jesus rises from the dead and he reveals himself first to the pious women who become the proclaimers of the great event: in fact the angel of the Lord tells them: ...Go and tell his disciples and Peter, 'He is going before you to Galilee; there you will see him, as he told you.'8
Inasmuch as the apostolic preaching met obstacles of all sorts, women educated hearts in the intimacy of home life and with effective private propaganda
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(and) brought religion everywhere, not excluding imperial palaces. - The Apostle recalls the name of various women who were of valid assistance to him: I commend to you Phoebe,9 our sister, who is [also] a minister of the Church at Cenchrae, so he tells the Romans, she has been a benefactor to many and to me as well. Greet Prisca and Aquila10 (two spouses) my co-workers in Christ Jesus, who risk their necks for my life, to whom not only I am grateful but also all the churches of the Gentiles; greet also the church at their house (that is, those who were gathered by this woman and by this man in their house for the breaking of the bread and in order to listen to God's word). Greet Mary, who has worked hard for you (a language that meant the work for the Gospel). Greet those workers in the Lord, Tryphaena and Tryphosa... Persis, who has worked hard in the Lord. Not much different are the greetings that St. Paul addresses to the different women in the letters to the Colossians, to the Philippians, the second letter to Timothy, etc.
Then there were two classes of persons who cooperated, almost by profession, with the apostles:11 the so-called prophetesses and deaconesses.12 The first, by a special grace, received from the Lord the spirit of prophecy (in a broad sense) and they were explaining to the people also the arcane meanings of the scriptures, particularly the prophetic ones, and the mysteries of the faith: different Letters and the Acts of the Apostles. The deaconesses
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lasted for many centuries in the Church and in some places, until the 16th century. They were virgins or widows, of proven virtues, chosen by the bishop, admitted to the service of the Church through a special blessing. Among their tasks, these were the principal ones: to assist at the baptism of women, to teach the women catechumens and also others in the truths of the faith, to visit the sick women, especially to prepare them to receive the priest, to watch over the coming in and out of women in the Church, etc. Tertullian13 and St. Clement of Alexandria14 bear witness to their merits in behalf of the Church and of the faith.

[In the history of the Church]

The stories of women in the Catholic Church would be very interesting and we hope that someone to write about them would soon emerge. Here, while silent about an infinite number of them, I shall remember Constantine15 the Great's mother and spouse not the least causes of the Church's freedom and of her triumph over paganism; Genevieve16 and Clotilde, wife of Clodovis, king of the Franks, to whom is credited her husband's conversion as well as that of his kingdom; Berta17 to whom a great part of England owes its faith; Jarislav and Lioba,18 venerated as missionaries of the Slavic, German, Hungarian countries. They are the happy first fruits of that large band of heroines19 who, in every century, left at the missionaries' side in order to bring the faith and civilization to savage countries of Asia, Africa, Oceania.
To three women are bound as well three events that
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in Church history had a most exceptional seriousness. The end of the stay, that was the cause of infinite troubles to the Church, that was rightly called exile or slavery in Avignon, is to be highly credited to Catherine of Siena: that woman, before whom unbelievers and no less than believers bow their heads, this most pious woman, literate,20 able in politics, but who received everything from penance and prayer. The temporal power of the popes, which, although was occasion of some evils, brought immense advantages to the Church, makes us immediately remember the name of the famous Matilde of Canossa, her firmness against the ambitious aims of the emperor, the help she extended to the Pope. Then, a humble young woman, Miss Jaricot21 creating the Opera della Propagazione della fede (Association of the Propagation of the Faith) has established the foundation of a glorious future for the Church, has opened the golden age of the Catholic missions.22
How many women saints whom we venerate on the altars and who, hence, were also gifted with heroic humility and they not only made women and girls fervent, but, having the occasion, they also urged to be zealous the very ministers of the Lord, the pastors of souls, the bishops and the popes! Just let everyone see what St. Bridget,23 Saint Catherine of Siena, Saint Mary Magdalene de' Pazzi,24 Saint Teresa,25 Saint Jean Frances of Chantal26 and countless others. When it had to do with promoting the glory of God and the good of
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souls not only did they pray but they also advised and exhorted persons high in dignity in the Church. And these were not offended, instead, they praised their zeal and availed with it themselves. Saint Jean Frances of Chantal wrote, in her memoirs, in a letter that was found after her death: You will have to remember to beseech the Monsignor of Geneva,27 that he instructed the small people of the city regarding the manner of hearing the holy mass with reverence and devotion and to make, in the morning, an offering to the Lord of all the actions of the day. Would St. Francis have needed advice on how to tend his sheep? Nonetheless the saint, believing it useful, did not hesitate to give it and St. Francis immediately benefited of it. Thus we read about St. Mary Magdalene de' Pazzi: Ardent in zeal for souls, she almost forgets her gender and her condition as sister; clothed by the Divine Spirit, she gave salutary pieces of advice to Giovanni28 de' Medici, archbishop of Florence, then Pope Leo XI, who responded to her; she dictated letters for superiors of religious houses so that they made reforms against abuses.
He recommended warmly to Maria de' Medici,29 Queen of France, that illustrious religion that was always the most persecuted religion in the world, and at that time banned by France. She assured her that she would have done great service to the divine glory by her commitment before the king, her spouse, so that in France religion be restored. Most warmly,
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she exhorted that queen to work in such a way that there the heresies be uprooted and that great country might go back to that piety wherein King Louis distinguished himself.30
In the biography of St. Catherine of Siena, the mystical marriage of her soul with her divine spouse, Jesus Christ, is described. And immediately after, one reads the order the Lord gives her: I want that your virtues be fruitful, not only for your own soul, but also with that of your neighbor. I want to bind you to me with the bonds of charity towards others. You know that two commandments, of love of neighbor and love of God, contains all the law: to you they must work as feet for walking and wings for flying and for leading souls to me...
St. Germaine Cousin31 was no one but a sickly shepherdess, with scrofula,32 maltreated by her stepmother; but in her heart burned the fire of zeal. While the herd pastured at the side of the mountains or were enclosed in the fold, she gathered boys and girls and taught them the catechism, how to live good lives and to flee from sin.
Historian Palladio33 draws for us a superb portrait of St. Olympia, deaconess, chosen by St. John Chrisostom:34 widowed at twenty years old, she rejected new marriages and dedicated her great wealth, her noble energies, her knowledge at the service of the Church. - She visited
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the sick in order to help them, to prepare them for the final step, to instruct them; she protected and consoled exiles, the imprisoned, the virgins: she was the strong cooperator of St. John Chrysostom in defending orthodoxy and in the instruction of the ignorant, in helping and serving different churches.
With the great patriarch exiled, she fought against heresies, repeated to the people the bishop's teachings and came to the point of even stimulating the zeal of the clergy against the threats of the heretics. - Perhaps it was due to her that St. John Chrysostom made this statement about women: they can participate in all the works that are for the public welfare.
We owe to Blessed Julienne of Liege35 the institution of that solemnity that is a true triumph of the Eucharist: the feast of Corpus Domini.
And, to pass to another order of events, let us remember that seven of the great doctors of the Church36 attest the almost decisive effectiveness of their own mothers as to their convictions, their character, their vocation: St. Basil, St. Gregory Nazianzene, St. John Chrysostom, St. Jerome, St. Ambrose and St. Augustine. - Let us remember37 that St. Catherine of Alexandria who argued against the most subtle pagan sophists, convinced them, converted them and they themselves becoming martyrs. That young woman, educated by St. Jerome on the books of St. Athanasius, was consulted by many and in Rome, did a great good for the faith. - Let us remember Melania,38 who refuted against Pelagius, argued
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with the stoics,39 converted Valusianus who remained obstinate also before the tight logic of St. Augustine.
Everyone knows the exceptional importance today of world events that are the Eucharistic Congresses. They take place for a number of years with such weight and abundance of truly most consoling fruits. Now: these originated from a humble servant of God who had this idea while in silence and in prayer.40 - Everyone can sense the spread and the effectiveness in Christian life of the devotion to the Most Sacred Heart of Jesus: now it was Jesus Christ who chose a humble sister of the Visitation as his apostle: Blessed Margaret Alacocque.41
Everyone knows how the events of Lourdes, half a century since, has contributed in the defeat of the French philosophism, material rationalism of yesterday and the disbelief that had become fashionable. Now it was Mary Most Immaculate who chose as her confidant and her apostle a girl, as innocent and simple: Bernadette Soubirous.42

[Eve and Mary]

I would be told: it was also a woman, Eve,43 who destroyed man and the whole human race. - Most true: and this proves the great power woman has over man. Women are compared to a great torrent... Left to their own, they become an element of destruction: but if man takes hold of it and channels it, from it would be drawn
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electrical energies that bring light and energy. - Could not the woman's power be put under the strong guidance of the priest?
The objection, however, leads us to speak about another woman: the Great Lady. She opens for us a new horizon that makes us know all the greatness of the woman's mission in the work of nature and of grace. In fact, with the mystery of the Incarnation, God raised the woman to a dignity that bears something of the divine. In this work of restoration, we find a woman foretold in the early paradise as a co-redemptrix and, later, described by the prophets and longed for by the patriarchs.
What glorious role this Woman has played, no one can tell us better than the Church which, to prepare the faithful for the annual commemoration of Christmas, poetically, but always theologically precise, sings:44 O Woman blessed through the angel's annunciation, but even more blessed because you are made fruitful by the virtues of the Holy Spirit, by you was born the One longed for by peoples!... O Mary, you have turned us into your adorable Son, just as much unhappy Eve has lay hold on us! You open the gates of heaven, so that the poor exiles on earth may come and enter there! You are the way to go to the king of the most high... People all, from slavery ransomed, rejoice for the life that the Virgin to you has brought! Mary most holy became the mother of God, the queen of saints, the
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hope of the miserable, the mediatrix, after Jesus Christ, of all grace and consolation of men. God wanted that we received everything from Mary, the blessed staff that brought forth the flower, blessed Jesus Christ, in whom and through whom all nations were blessed. Thus, by divine will, life emerges from that gender that brought death on earth.
Before the greatness of Mary most holy, man understood once more the dignity of his companion, reviled during the pagan times: woman came to understand again her nature and her mission: the Church wanted her as part of her vocation as guide of souls to heaven!45
It is not that woman could obtain a preponderant, teaching, governing part in the Church, no; but she always had a subordinate, most effective part. It is God who chooses as instrument of his marvels ignorant and humble persons in order to confound the wise46 and the proud: it is God who chooses weak persons in order to confound the strong: it is God who chooses means that appear despicable so that the power of his works may better appear. It is good to further add: woman has in her self in latent state, most often, a torrent of most precious energies: unrecognized, they degenerate, if they are not consumed in empty petty talks or in evil: well guided they perform marvels that man could not have achieved.
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1 Cf. Prv 31:10.

2 Cf. The books of Esther and of Judith. For Deborah, read Gn 35:8; Jgs 4-5; Tb 1:8.

3 Cf. Jgs 4:18-23.

4 Cf. Jdt 15:9.

5 Cf. Lk 2:25-38.

6 Cf. Jn 4:7ff.

7 Regarding the women following Jesus, cf. Mt 27:55; 28:5; Mk 15:40-41; Lk 8:2; 23:27,49,55; 24:10,22,24; Acts 1:14.

8 Cf. Mk 16:7.

9 Cf. Rom 16:1.

10 Cf. Rom 16:3ff and also 1Cor 16:19 and 2Tm 4:19.

11 DA has an Italian typographical error: agli instead of con gli.

12 For the title of prophetess, cf. Ex 15:20; Jgs 4:4; 2Kgs 22:14; 2Chr 34:22; Neh 6:14; Is 8:3 and in the New Testament Lk 2:6 and Rv 2:20. For the title of deaconess cf. Rom 16:1, in reference to “sister” Phoebe.

13 Quintus Septimius Florentius Tertullian (160-250 ca.), of Carthage, in Africa, was an apologist who defended the Christian faith against the Gnostic heresy (MM).

14 Clement of Alexandria (150-212) was one of the Fathers of the Greek Church who tried to reconcile Platonism and Christianity (MM).

15 Elena Flavia Giulia (250-330), first wife of Constantius I Clorus, Constantine's mother. She is highly merited for her support to the Christian religion after the edict of 313 and for the construction of the Basilicas of Rome and of the Holy Land. - Fausta Flavia Maxima (298-326), daughter of Maximilianus, emperor, and sister of Maxentius, was married to Constantine in Gaul when she was still a child, in 307. In life and in death she was involved in family tragedies.

16 Cf. BOLO, La donna e il clero, op. cit., pp. 16-17.

17 This saint, married to the king of Kent, had five daughters whom she educated in the faith. Widowed, she became abbess of a convent she herself founded. She died in 725(MM). Cf. what is said of Berta: VENTURA G., La donna cattolica, II, Milano-Genova 1855, p. 304: “The English monarchy and nationality are the work of one French princess, St. Berta, daughter of Caribert, king of Paris. It was she who converted to Christianity King Edelbert, her husband, and England.”

18 Thus it appears in DA. Here, Alberione perhaps depends on BOLO, La donna e il clero, op. cit., p. 16f. Lioba (o Leoba, Leobgytha, Truthgeba) is a Benedictine saint, abbess about the year 745 in the convent she herself founded in Tauberbischofsheim in Baden. Related to St. Boniface on her mother's side, she participated with him in the Christianization of Germany. She died on 28 September 782 (or 779/780) in Schörnsheim, near Munchen (MM). - Regarding Iarislaw (Jarislaw o Jaroslaw) different princes are known, in Kiev and in other Slav territories, but it is not easy to relate them with the holy women referred to here.

19 DA has eroi = heroes.

20 Perhaps illetterata = illiterate.

21 DA has Iaricot. Cf. BOLO, La donna e il clero, op. cit., p. 17. Pauline-Marie Jaricot is the foundress of the Association for the Propagation of the Faith - cf. DA 40; 47; 79; 108; 115; 174-175; 327. Born in Lyon on 22 July 1799, she also died there on 9 January 1862. She belonged to a rich family of industrialists and had a carefree youth. She changed after a serious illness. Enlightened by her brother Philéas, who eventually became a missionary, Pauline-Marie started from among young workers and some influential members of the Catholic laity, that movement for prayer and collection of donations that on 3 May 1822 became the great work of assistance for the Catholic missions. Inspired by the desire for reparation and by the desire of spreading the good press, Jaricot founded in 1826 also the living rosary - cf. DA 115; 306. Sensing how misery favored the de-Christianization of workers, she wanted to try a remedy with a bold undertaking: the establishing of a Christian factory. To this purpose, she bought the factories of Rustrel, in the lower Alps, in order to run it as a cooperative. But she was cheated, and the venture failed. Her process of beatification was started in 1930.

22 Some of these organizations were, for example, the Opera della Santa Infanzia (Association of Holy Childhood), of the Scuole d'Oriente (Schools of the Orient), of St. Peter Claver, the Œuvres apostoliques, il Bonifaciusverein, la Ludwigsverein, l'Œuvre des partants and the like, all started with the purpose of supporting with money one or the other regions or apostolic institutions of the world. The “missionary” organization most referred to by Alberione was probably the Propagation of the Faith (in existence till 3 May 1822) conceived by Pauline Jaricot.

23 Bridget Persson (born in 1303) was Swedish and belonged to a noble family. She was married against her will and for a year remained a virgin. Then she had eight children among whom was St. Catherine of Sweden. She founded the Order of the Most Holy Savior (Bridgidine). She also gave advice to more than one pope, as Pope Urban V and Gregory XI. She died in Rome in 1373. Alberione was affectionately bound to this saint since he was a child because of a small church dedicated to her near the Cascina Agricola, where the Alberione family moved, in the fields of Cherasco. Before that small church, his mother waited for little Giacomo at dusk, on his return from elementary school.

24 She is a Carmelite nun saint (1566-1607) of noble Florentine family and belonging to the San Frediano monastery.

25 Teresa de Cepeda y Ahumada was born in Avila, Spain, on 29 March 1515 and died in Alba de Tormes on 4 October 1582. She had a fervent childhood and a dissipated early adolescence. The day of her profession, she got sick and decided to dedicate herself to prayer. Recovered from her sickness through the intercession of St. Joseph, she backslid once more and immersed herself in mundane company. Her father's death (1543) pushed Teresa back to prayer and remained faithful in it. In 1560, at the height of the Council of Trent (1545-1563), Teresa could undertake fervorously the reformation of the Carmelite Order. This brought the Discalced Carmelite back to the observance of the early rules. A practical woman, she took charge of the least things of the monastery, without neglecting ever the economic part. Alberione often refers to this saint - cf. DA 47; 182; 225; 244; 246; 335.

26 Frances Frémyot (1572-1641) was born in Dijon, France, in a rich family. After the death of her husband, Baron de Chantal, she dedicated herself to the Catholic apostolate at a time when Lutheranism and Calvinism were spreading in France. Under the guidance of Francis of Sales, she founded in 1710 the order of the Visitation (MM).

27 He is Francis of Sales (1567-1622), Bishop of Geneva, doctor of the Church, protector of journalists, born in the castle of Sales (in the Savoia area) on 21 August 1567 and died in Lyon (France) on 28 December 1622. Alberione often refers to this saint - cf. DA 67; 239; 244; 247; 248; 335. The Philotea was a book often used in the meditations to seminarians.

28 DA has Alessandro. In fact, he who became Leo X (1513-1521) was Giovanni de' Medici (1475-1521), son of Lorenzo di Magnificent. Elected Pope (1513), he recognized the Gallican Church (1516). Peaceful by nature, he oscillated politically between France and Spain and in the end allied himself with Charles V of Augsburg (Spain and Austria) against French Francis I of Valois (1521). A lover of the arts and extravagance, he impoverished the coffers of the Church but he promoted literature, the sciences and the arts. The date of Luther's Reformation (the publication of his 92 theses at the Cathedral of Wuttenburg in 1517) coincide with the 4

th year of this pope's pontificate. If the author truly referred to Alexander and not Giovanni de' Medici, then the pope he refers to would be, invariably, Alexander XI, who reigned from 1 April to 27 of the same month, in 1605: only 25 days of pontificate (MM).

29 Maria de' Medici (1573-1642) was the daughter of Francis II of Tuscany. She married Henry IV of France (1600). Regent for her son Louis XIII (1610-1615) she elicited the hatred of the people and of the nobles due to the influence allowed to Concino Concini, a Florentine gentleman in her court. Maria was exiled by her son in England and then in Cologne, in Germany.

30 Perhaps he alludes to Louis, the Pious (778-840), Charlemagne's younger son. He might also be referring to Louis IX, saint, (1214-1270), son of Blanca de Castilla.

31 She was born near Tolouse, land of struggle between Catholics and Huguenots, in 1579. Ill since childhood deprived of use of her right arm, she also was exposed to repugnant skin diseases. She was berated by her own family. At nine years old, she was isolated taking care of a herd of sheep. Coming home from pasture, she was forced to sleep in the barn. She did nothing special during her life. She was found dead one morning during the summer of 1601, at 22 years old. In 1644, however, her body was found intact and the treatment of her fellow parishioners changed. She was but a devote farmer, “a bigot” according to others, but she became the patroness of the Mouvement rural de la jeunesse chrétienne féminine (Rural movement of female Christian youth).

32 The scrufola (from “scrofa”) is the swelling of the lymph glands of the neck due to tuberculosis.

33 Blosio Palladio (1508-1580) was at first the secretary of Pope Clement VII and then of Paul III who designated him bishop of Foligno in (MM).

34 DA here and below has Grisostomo.

35 Julienne of Liege, or of Cornillon, was born in Retinnes, near Liege, in 1191. Having been orphaned, she took the veil about the year 1207. She had her first vision in 1209, followed by many others. Towards the year 1230 she became the prioress of Mont-Cornillon and composed a holy office. She resigned as superior on 2 May 1248, and retired in Fosses where she died on 5 April 1258.

36 Seven... in fact, Fr. Alberione lists only six. The seventh Father could be St. Athanasius of Alexandria (cf. DA 139, note 14). Their saintly mothers are, respectively: of Basil, St. Emilia; of Gregory, St. Nonna; of John Chrysostom, St. Anthusa; of Augustine, St. Monica. The names of the others are not known to us.

37 Here Alberione makes a synthesis of BOLO, La donna e il clero, op. cit., p. 153, on “learned women in the past”.

38 Melania the Younger (383-439), a Roman noble woman, niece of the other Melania, the Elder, relative of St. Paulinus of Nola, left Rome after the death of her children, moved on to Sicily and then to Jerusalem, where she founded the monastery of the Mount of Olives. She was in communication with Paulinus, Jerome, Augustine, and had a dispute with Pelagius (354-427), the Brittany monk refuted by Augustine.

39 DA has storici = historians, instead of stoici = stoics.

40 Refers to Marie Marta Emilia Tamisier (Tours 1884-1910). Inspired by Pierre Giulienne Eymard, she decided to spread the devotion to the Eucharist among the people, by imitating Marian devotion expressed in pilgrimages to sanctuaries. She encouraged and organized in such a way pilgrimages to sanctuaries bound to the Eucharist and to Eucharistic miracles. The first pilgrimage to the Chapel of the Grey Penitents of Avignon dates back to 1874. Msgr. L. G. de Ségur, archbishop of Paris, made the initiative his and obtained the approval of Pope Leo XIII for the Opera dei Congressi (1881). Cf. La Civiltà Cattolica 4 [1910] 80.

41 A Sister of the Visitation, she was born on 22 July 1647 near Paray-le-Monial, in the diocese of Autun, in France. Turned fatherless in a numerous family, she knew suffering early. At 24 years old, on 25 May 1671, she joined the Sisters of the Visitation of Paray. While Janseenism was spreading everywhere, the devotion to the Sacred Heart started through the efforts of this woman.

42 DA has Bernardetta Soubiroux. Bernadette or Marie Bernard Soubirous was born on 7 January 1844 in Lourdes where the Immaculate Conception had an apparition from 11 February to 16 July 1858. On 30 October 1867 she made her religious profession among the sisters of Nevers. “She is good for nothing,” the then Superior General noted, but Msgr. Forcade gave her an assignment: “My daughter, I confer to you the duty of praying.”

43 Regarding Eve, cf. Gn 3:20; 4:1; Tb 8:6; 2Cor 11:3; 1Tm 2:13.

44 This hymn used to belong to the Lauds of the Common of the Feasts of Our Lady, in the commemoration of Mary on Saturday and in the Dedication of a Church. (MM). (Translation ours).

45 To the devotion to Mary, Fr. Alberione wanted to give his own contribution since the start of his priestly life by writing a small book, La B. Vergine delle Grazie in Cherasco (La Madonnina), Memorie-ossequi, [The Blessed Virgin of Graces in Cherasco (the Madonnina), Memories-homages] Alba 1912, 136 pp., 8 ill.

46 Cf. 1Cor 1:25-27; 4:10; 2Cor 12:9-10.