Day 50 -- Blessed Luigi Guanella

"The altar points our way to heaven."

What I have been noticing about so many saints come from poor, but pious families and did proud and noble things for their towns, countries, and the Catholic Church.

Blessed Luigi Guanella is no different. He was born on December 9, 1842 in Italy. He was the 9th of 13 children. Luigi entered the seminary at age 12 and he was ordained on May 26, 1866. He worked with Saint John Bosco for 3 years to care for homeless children. He opened a school for the poor in Traona, Italy while he was assigned as a parish priest. Unfortunately, the anti-Catholic Masons forced it closed in 1881.

So then in that same year, he founded an orphanage and nursing home. In 1886 they outgrew the facility and they moved the home to a larger building and named it Little House of Divine Providence. It was there that he also founded the Daughters of Saint Mary of Providence to minister to the residents. They received papal approval in 1917 and today have over 1,200 Sisters working in over 100 homes. In 1908 Luigi founded a men's congregation, the Servants of Charity and they received papal approval 1928 and today they have 500 brothers in over 50 homes. He was an advisor to Pope Saint Pius X and Blessed Andrea Carlo Ferrari.

He worked in the United States with Italian immigrants in 1912 and the following year he founded the Confraternity of Saint Joseph. The mission was to pray for the dying and today they have 10 million members. He never technically retired and in his older age he wrote meditations and inspirational works. In 1915, just months before his death, he went into the fields to minister to those who had been harmed by recent earthquakes in the area. He died on October 24, 1915 after complications from a stroke on September 27, 1915. He was beatified on October 25, 1964 by Pope Paul VI in Rome.

There are so many quotes from Blessed Luigi. Here are a few that I really liked:
Prayer is lifting our minds and hearts to God.
Only a fool or a madman lives without a goal.
The Eucharist is the treasury of God's love.
A day without Holy Communion is like a day without the sun.
Live only for God whose son died for you.


PRAYER
O Blessed Luigi Guanella, apostle of charity who spread the treasures of your heart to the poor and suffering, whom you dearly loved, in a world filled with hatred and selfishness, obtain for us from Divine Providence an ever increasing love of God and our neighbor. Obtain for us also the favor we are now asking for, and the grace of final perseverance. Amen.

Knowing that Blessed Luigi helped Italian immigrants is what made me want to read and write about him. My family came here from Italy and yesterday I went to Ellis Island. It was very moving and I can only imagine what my family members thought when they came over here and if they hit any obstacles. My Grama was only 20 days old when her family arrived here.