I received this from my friend Fr. Carlos Martins, who has organized the US tour of the relics of St. Maria Goretti.
Pilgrimage of Mercy: the Tour of the Major Relics of St. Maria Goretti
From September to November of this year the major relics of St. Maria Goretti will make a pilgrimage to the United States. It is the first time that her body travels to the USA and only the second time that it has left Italy.
While St. Maria is universally known as the Patroness of Purity, her greatest virtue was her unyielding forgiveness of her attacker even in the midst of horrendous physical suffering, a forgiveness that would completely convert him and set him on a path to personal holiness. In March His Holiness, Pope Francis, announced an Extraordinary Holy Year of Mercy beginning December 8th. This visit of the major relics of St. Maria Goretti is an effort on the part of the Congregation for the Causes of Saints and Treasures of the Church (www.TreasuresOfTheChurch.com) to prepare and catechize the United States for this great celebration in the life of the Church.
Directed by Fr. Carlos Martins, CC, the Pilgrimage will cover churches, schools and prisons in 28 dioceses spanning 18 states.
Webpage: www.MariaGoretti.com
Facebook: www.facebook.com/MariaGorettiUSA
Twitter: @GorettiUsa
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Cool. Gratifying. Hopeful. The Church & Her Patrimony, especially Succession. Sacraments. Saints.
We are blessed beyond measure. Thank you, God. Thank you, Fr. Z for helping to keep us informed.
St. Maria Goretti, pray for us. Much, please.
St. Maria Goretti will be visiting my parish. I’m excited about being able to venerate her relics.
St. Maria Goretti will be at St. John Vianney Parish in Northlake, IL and St. John Cantius Parish in Chicago! Thanks for posting Fr. Z.!
NBW: Thank you. St. John Cantius is very doable for me.
I love St. Maria Goretti, but I am dismayed that our Holy Father is replacing purity with “mercy” even with the relics of this dear saint. It really seems ridiculously ideological. Obviously, she showed great mercy, but I doubt that it is coincidental, given Pope Francis’ agenda for the upcoming Synod, that we are to reflect on mercy shown to the impure (though eventually repentant) Alessandro!
St. Maria Goretti will be visiting my parish- St. Thomas Aquinas in the Charlotte Diocese. We are blessed to have her.
I can’t tell you what His Holiness thinks, but I’d say that the repentance is the real point, isn’t it? St. Maria Goretti didn’t die to excuse his sin — if she wanted to excuse his sin, she could’a got away alive, now couldn’t she — but rather she died to save his soul.
The only place in the St Louis Metro area to see St Maria Goretti is the St Peter’s Cathedral in Belleville, IL Diocese. (No MO location listed at this time.)
“I am dismayed that our Holy Father is replacing purity with “mercy”
I wonder if the apparent de-emphasis on St. Maria’s purity is intended to avoid giving offense to victims of sexual assault and abuse. If we assume that St. Maria’s holiness was based solely or primarily upon her having chosen death/martyrdom rather than compromise her chastity, then one would have to conclude that resisting to the point of death is the most, or only, honorable thing for a faithful Catholic girl/woman to do in that situation, and that to do anything less would be sinful or at the very least, weak or cowardly, as it might be for someone threatened with martyrdom for some other aspect of the Faith.
As much as I value the virtue of chastity and think that it needs to be promoted more than ever in today’s world, I’m not so sure that I’d want young girls and women to come away thinking that they should always choose (or should have chosen) to die rather than be raped. However, that is NOT, from what I can tell, the entirety of St. Maria’s story — her holiness was manifested just as much, if not more, in her concern for the salvation of her assailant, as it was in her concern for her own soul. It should also be noted that the mercy St. Maria showed to Alessandro did NOT mean he was excused from being arrested and punished according to law, as he did serve considerable time in prison prior to his repentance.
Many saints are patrons of more than one virtue.
Remember that — from the lips of Maria Goretti herself — her cry was: “No, Allessandro, stop or you will go to hell!”
At the moment of her attack, she was concerned with sin and salvation — one might say even more than concern about her own body, safety and purity. She is indeed “The Little Saint of Great Mercy.”