Saint Rita of Cassia
His party is celebrated on May 22
Biography of Saint Rita of Cascia
Santa Rita was born in 1381 next to Casia, her second homeland, in the beautiful Umbria, land of Saints: Benito, Scholastica, Francisco, Clara, Angela, Gabriel… Santa Rita belongs to that distinguished group of women who went through all the states: married, widowed and religious. On the other hand, few saints have enjoyed as much devotion as Santa Rita, Lawyer of the impossible. Her favorite passion was meditating on the Passion of Jesus.
The ancient biographers enamel their childhood with untold wonders. The truth is that she was a precocious girl, inclined to the things of God, that she knew how to read the Creator’s messages in creatures. Her soul was a taut string unraveling in harmonies dedicated exclusively to Jesus.
Since she was a child, she felt a strong inclination towards religious life. But divine Providence arranged for her to pass through all the states, to sanctify them and spread the light of her example and the aroma of her virtue. She was an extraordinary model of wife, mother, widow and nun.
For family reasons, she married Pablo Fernando, from her native village. It was a real martyrdom, because Paul was capricious and violent. Rita accepts her role: shut up, suffer, pray. Her kindness and patience achieves the conversion of her husband. Two twins are born that fill them with joy. Peace follows tragedy. Her husband is murdered, as a consequence of her old life. Rita forgives and that is instilled in her children. And now an incomprehensible scene happens from a natural point of view. Seeing that she cannot get them to abandon the idea of revenge, she asks the Lord to take them away, to avoid a new crime, and the Lord hears her plea.
Difficult years are coming now. His loneliness, his tears, his prayers. She now tries to fulfill her childhood wish; be religious Three times she wishes to enter the Augustinians of Cascia, and all three times she is rejected.
Finally, with a prodigy that seems to have been plucked from the Florecillas, Saint John the Baptist, Saint Augustine and Saint Nicholas of Tolentino appear to her and on wings she is introduced into the monastery. She is admitted, she makes her profession that same year of 1417, and there she spends 40 years, only for God.
He diligently traveled the path of perfection, the three paths of spiritual life, purgative, illuminative and unitive. Demanding asceticism, humility, poverty, charity, fasting, sackcloth, vigils. The nuns refer to a beautiful Florecilla. The Prioress orders him to water a dry branch. Rita rigorously complies with the order for several months and the branch turns green. And the witnesses say that the miraculous vine still lives.
Jesus does not spare chosen souls the test of love through pain. Rita, like Francis of Assisi, is sealed with one of the stigmata of the Passion: a very painful thorn on her forehead. There are requests from the devil and from the flesh, which she calmed by applying a lighted candle to her hand or foot. Purifying tests, suspicious glances, mocking smiles. Rita looks at the Crucifix and in that school she learns her lesson.
The hour of his death is also told to us full of delicious wonders. In the convent garden a rose and two figs are born in the middle of winter to satisfy her sick cravings. When she dies, her cell lights up and the bells toll alone to glory. her body follows incorrupt.
When Rita died, the wound on her forehead shone on her face like a star on a rosebush. It was the year 1457. Thus Jesus rewarded with sweet consolations the ordeal of his passionate lover. Pope Leo XIII canonized her in 1900.
Santa Rita de Casia is the patron saint of housewives.
Prayer to Saint Rita of Cascia
You who have known so many difficulties. You know what it takes to be patient. You, the Saint of the impossible. Give me the strength to know how to wait!
You who have accepted contempt and criticism and even violence in your own home. You who have seen your maternal tenderness ridiculed. Tell me how you can still love!
You who have loved God so much. You who have had so much mercy for the Lord, who have suffered his crucified wounds on your body. Teach me to know how to look at and understand the cross!
I ask you for all those who dare not wait any longer, for all those who do not believe in miracles. Help us find the Risen One!
Novena to Saint Rita of Cascia
EXHORTATION for devotees who wish to make this novena fruitful
The perfect way to venerate the Saints is to imitate their virtues; because paying reverent gifts to these chosen ones of God, moaning at the foot of his respectable altar, imploring their protection, wanting through it to open and spill the treasures of the grace and beneficence of our God, and at the same time allowing oneself to be seduced and dragged from the spirit of the world, of the love of pleasure, of impiety, is a false devotion, a harmful hypocrisy, an illusion of the heart, an apparent, sterile and superficial cult. Devotion to the Saints must be true, interior, active and permanent, that is, that we imitate their love for God, their charity towards others, their penance, their humility, their faith, their religion, their justice and their zeal. Such is the way to obtain the mercy of the Lord, the protection of his servants, the remission of sins and the sanctification of our souls.
Kneeling, in front of some image of Santa Rita; After making the sign of the cross and saying the act of contrition, the novena will begin:
PREPARATORY PRAYER FOR EVERY DAY
Almighty and merciful Lord God, convert me to repent of my sins. Touch me so that I get up and come to you and have mercy on me. Deliver me Lord, from all present and future evils, grant me spiritual and temporal peace. Bless the Pope, the Bishops and the Priests so that they guide the People of God with success, enlighten all those who have in their hands the destinies of our Country, so that they govern according to the principles of the Gospel, give them a straight heart to do not stray from the path of your justice. I ask you to grant me the remedy for my needs that I now present to you…, and that I intercessor Santa Rita de Casia, whom I will invoke in this novena. Give me, Lord, your grace, so that one day I can sing your praises in heaven. Amen.
PETITION TO SAINT RITA OF CASIA
Blessed and advocate of the impossible, Santa Rita de Casia, luminous model of patience, scourge of demons, refuge of the needy, and example of Christian life; Beloved wife of Christ, crowned with one of her sacred thorns, I beg you, if it is for the glory of God and the good of my soul, that you obtain from God what I ask of you in this NOVENA; Above all, obtain for me a total conversion and that I can amend my bad life through the merits of my Lord Jesus Christ and the merits of his Most Holy Mother. Amen.
First day
PRAYER
God of goodness, Lord of angels, refuge of those who hope in you, listen to my pleas, for the merits of all the saints and in particular for those of Saint Rita de Casia, since she was always willing to fulfill your holy will. Through her intercession, I beg you to grant me to always live as an authentic Christian, hoping you grant me the grace and favor that I ask of you in this NOVENA….if it is for your glory and the good of my soul. Amen.
Twenty-two Hail Marys are prayed here to Saint Rita de Casia.
LORD’S WORD
Jesus tells you: “Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the Kingdom of Heaven. Blessed are those who mourn, because they will be comforted. Blessed are those who suffer, because they will inherit the earth. blessed are the merciful, for they shall obtain mercy. Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God. Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called children of God. Blessed are the persecuted for justice’s sake, because of them. It is the Kingdom of heaven. Blessed are you when they insult you, persecute you and say false things about you because of me. Rejoice and jump for joy, because your reward will be great in heaven “. (Matthew 5, 3-12)
(A few moments of reflection; and let us ask for the grace that we wish to obtain through the intercession of Saint Rita.)
Prices:
– That all men respect and love life as a gift from God, and that Christians bear witness to an orderly way of living, we pray to the Lord.
– That we sanctify human life, maintaining and developing in us sanctifying grace, we pray to the Lord.
– That family life may be a coexistence centered and directed by the love of God, we pray to the Lord.
Our father…
CLOSING PRAYER
Glorious Saint Rita, you who in a prodigious way participated in the painful Passion of Our Lord Jesus Christ, make it possible for me to suffer, with Christian resignation, the sorrows and difficulties of life and protect me in all my needs. Amen.
second day
LORD’S WORD
Jesus tells you: “Whoever accepts my commandments and fulfills them, he loves me. Whoever loves me, my Father will love him, I will also love him and I will manifest myself to him”. (John 14, 21)
(A few moments of reflection; and let us ask for the grace that we wish to obtain through the intercession of Saint Rita.)
Prices:
– That our faith impels us to better know and practice all the content of the Gospel, we pray to the Lord.
– That in all circumstances, even the most adverse, we may maintain fidelity and witness to the Christian faith, we pray to the Lord.
– That we know how to be apostles of Christ with our Christian behavior, let us pray to the Lord.
Our father…
CLOSING PRAYER
God, Holy Father, whom the angelic choirs adore and praise, and to whom I join, I offer you and consecrate all the merits of Saint Rita de Casia, protector and patron of mine, especially the great love with which she loved you, the detachment and abandonment in which he had all the things and honors of the world, only for consecrating himself to you. I ask you, Lord and my God, for the love and merits of this holy bearer of peace for your Church, listen to my request that I make of you in this NOVENA…, if it is for your glory and the good of my soul. Amen.
third day
LORD’S WORD
Jesus tells you: “Whoever does not take up his cross and come after me cannot be my disciple.” (Luke 14, 27)
(A few moments of reflection; and let us ask for the grace that we wish to obtain through the intercession of Saint Rita.)
Prices:
– That we never lose hope no matter how many the demands or sufferings of life may be, we pray to the Lord.
– That at the same time that we trust in God, we maintain the effort to be constantly faithful to his will, we pray to the Lord.
– That youth may live with hope and know how to direct their lives in the best Christian sense, we pray to the Lord.
Our father…
CLOSING PRAYER
I ask you, Lord, through the intercession of Saint Rita, that you fill my heart with light and joy and that you grant me, through her merits, the favor that I ask of you in this NOVENA…, if it is for your glory and the good of my soul. . Amen.
fourth day
LORD’S WORD
Jesus tells you: “This is my commandment: that you love one another as I have loved you. Greater love has no one for his friends than he who gives his life for them. You are my friends, if you do what I command you… that you love one another…