Dear Friends,
St. Gianna Beretta Molla was a wife and mother and a pediatrician who refused to terminate her fourth pregnancy for the sake of her own health. She gave her life for the life of her daughter, Gianna Emanuela Molla, a physician who travels the world speaking in support of life.
Perhaps we should not be surprised that a movie about a heroic woman opened in conjunction with International Women’s Day last week. Cabrini is a limited biography of St. Frances Xavier Cabrini, the first American saint. This compelling account shows some of the horrors endured by immigrants to the United States in the late 19th and early 20th Centuries through the eyes of a small group of religious sisters who sought to serve orphaned children living in what, even-then, should have been entirely unacceptable conditions.
There is no acceptable excuse for inhumanely treating any living being. Scenes in Cabrini portray true physical, mental, and spiritual assaults which can never be justified. We do well to learn about the conditions of the world beyond our own experiences.
We are blessed to live and worship among many parishioners who act heroically every day. They care for people in need within their families, among their friends, and with people not previously known to them. They reach out in selfless sacrifice. I thank God every day for each of you. Sadly, people continue to suffer here and elsewhere. Cabrini ends with the question, “What kind of world do we want, and what will we do to achieve it?” For us, that is a beginning. I know that you join your prayers to mine for the time when every person’s dignity is upheld and celebrated, when people no longer inflict hurt and pain on one another, where we love our neighbors, all of our neighbors, as we love ourselves.
In Christ,
Fr. Jim