Saint Gemma Galgani 19C

Saint Gemma Galgani was born in 1878 in the province of Lucca, Italy. Her family was fairly wealthy with properties and land, but her father lost everything after the premature death of his wife, Gemma’s mother, who died of tuberculosis in 1886. It was then, upon her mother’s death, that Saint Gemma first heard the inner voice that would accompany her throughout her life, asking her to let her mother go. She died at twenty-five. Later, she became a nun and got the Stigmata. For most of her life, Saint Gemma Galgani was a devotee to the Passion of the Christ, are you?

Saint Gemma Galgani Biography

On 11 April, the Church celebrates the liturgical memory of Saint Gemma Galgani, a mystic and seer who died at only 25 years of age, beatified in 1933 and canonised in 1940 by Pope Pius XII.  It was while studying with the Oblate Sisters of the Holy Spirit that she became religious and met many figures who nurtured her faith. Two of them, Sister Camilla Vagliensi and Sister Giulia Sestini, encouraged her to delve deeper into and meditate on the sufferings endured by Jesus during the Passion and to practise humility and penance. However, due to her frail health, Saint Gemma Galgani was never admitted to a convent.

In 1894, Saint Gemma Galgani also lost her brother Gino, a seminarian who died of tuberculosis at eighteen. She suffered so deeply from this loss that she tried to fall ill herself by wearing her brother’s clothes and indeed contracted the disease, becoming bedridden. Shortly after, her father also passed away. At nineteen, she was taken in by her aunt, Carolina Galgani.

Since 1899, Gemma had been drawn to the Congregation of the Passion of Jesus Christ. Meanwhile, the young woman’s health deteriorated further, with excruciating kidney pain and progressive paralysis of her legs due to osteitis of the lumbar vertebrae, compounded by acute purulent otitis media. Bedridden and nearing death, she came into contact with Gabriel of Our Lady of Sorrows, a young Passionist mystic who had died very young, to whom Gemma was deeply devoted, and who would appear to her several times.

After her recovery, Saint Gemma Galgani tried to enter the Monastery of the Visitation in Lucca but was not accepted there either. The Giannini family, a wealthy household that hosted Passionist Fathers passing through the city, offered her food and lodging. Through the Passionists, Gemma had befriended Cecilia Giannini, who lived with her brother Matteo Giannini, a pharmacist, and his large family. She lived with them for four years.

She was removed from the house out of fear of contagion when her tuberculosis worsened. She died shortly after, on Holy Saturday, 11 April 11, 1903, at just twenty-five years old. Shortly before her death, Gemma had received from Jesus the exhortation to found a monastery of Passionist nuns in Lucca, which was established after her death. Her body was dressed in the Passionist habit, which she had longed to wear in life, and her remains are still preserved in the monastery built according to her wishes.

In her diary, Saint Gemma Galgani testifies to her life and faith journey. Here, the Saint speaks of the vow of chastity she pronounced in 1899 and her first mystical experiences. Her mystical ecstasies occurred every Thursday, characterized by the apparitions of an angel and, according to popular tradition, by sweating blood, crowning with thorns, and other physical manifestations, which led to the appearance of stigmata on 8 June 1899.

Conclusion

Saint Gemma Galgani did not achieve her goal in life, but she remained faithful her brief life. Her rewards after life were great. Not only was she buried in the Nun’s habit she always wanted, but she was declared a Catholic Saint. Due to Saint Gemma Galgani’s devotion and her ceaseless dialogue with God, many of the faithful want to pray to her in times of emergency. Here are some prayers to Saint Gemma.