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VEYO Patron Saints
St. Rita of Cascia
Born: 1386 Rocca Porena, Italy
Died: May 22, 1456 at Cascia
Feast Day: May 22
Patron Saint of: abuse victims, desperate causes, difficult marriages, victims of physical spousal abuse, loneliness
From her early youth Rita visited the Augustinian nuns at Cascia and showed interest in a religious life. However, when she was 12, her parents betrothed her to Paolo Mancini, an ill-tempered abusive individual who worked as town watchman and was dragged into the political disputes of the Guelphs and Ghibellines.
Rita married him at age 18 and was the mother of twin sons. She put up with Paolo’s abuses for eighteen years before he was ambushed and stabbed to death. She tried in vain to dissuade her twin sons from attempting to take revenge; she appealed to Heaven to prevent such a crime on their part, and they were taken away by death, reconciled to God.
Upon the deaths of her sons, Rita again felt the call to religious life. She applied for admission to the Augustinian convent at Cascia, but, being a widow, was refused. After repeated efforts, she was finally admitted to the monastery of Saint Mary Magdalen at age 36.
Rita lived 40 years in the convent, spending her time in prayer and charity and working for peace in the region. Devoted to the passion of Christ, she asked in prayer to suffer as Christ did, and she received a chronic head wound that appeared to have been caused by a crown of thorns and which bled for 15 years.
Confined to her bed for the last four years of her life, Rita’s only request was a rose from her family’s estate. Since it was January, and there was no hope of finding a flower, there, sprouted on an otherwise bare bush, was a single rose blossom.
Rita is well-known as a patron of desperate, seemingly impossible causes and situations. This is because she has been involved in so many stages of life - wife, mother, widow, and nun, she buried her family, helped bring peace to her city, saw her dreams denied and fulfilled - and never lost her faith in God, or her desire to be with Him.
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