June 1, 2025 - "Augustinian Saints"

Margherita Lotti—referred to as “Rita” by her family and friends was born in Roccapornea in the Umbria region of Italy (where Saints Francis and Clare of Assisi also came from) probably in 1381. Her parents made sure that she had a good schooling and education from the Augustinian friars at Cascia.  Although she expressed a desire to be a nun (and she knew the Augustinian nuns who were in her parish), her parents had other plans for her.  Around 1395, she entered an arranged marriage with Paolo di Ferdinando di Mancino.  Paolo was involved in the controversies and political rivalries of the day.  He was reported to have been an abusive and unfaithful husband to Rita.  But through prayer and patience and the ability to pacify that she learned from her parents, she was able to help Paolo slowly but surely live a more authentically Christian way of life.  Rita and Paolo had two sons: Giangiacomo and Paolo Maria.  Their marriage lasted eighteen years when he was murdered by a local family with whom he had been carrying on a blood feud.

 

According to the customs of the time Giangiacomo and Paolo Maria would have been expected to kill someone from the rival family to avenge the death of their father. To avoid having her sons seek revenge, Rita hid their father’s bloody shirt. Rita forgave the murderers of her husband, but the di Mancino family refused to let the incident pass unanswered and pressed for revenge.  Rancor and hostility arose. Rita did not cease praying that more bloodshed would be averted and that her sons would not commit that sin. God seems to have answered her prayer by letting both die from natural causes before they could carry out the vendetta.  Rita’s only comfort was to think of their souls, no longer in danger after escaping the climate of retaliation aroused by the death of her spouse, their father.

 

Now alone, Rita sought to pursue her original path and enter the convent.  At the age of 36, she asked to be welcomed by the Augustinian nuns of the Monastery of Santa Maria Maddalena of Cascia, but her request was rejected.  The nuns may have feared the entrance of Rita, the widow of a murdered man, might have jeopardized the security of the community.  Rita’s prayers and the intercessions of her patron saints—Saint Augustine, Saint Nicholas of Tolentine, and Saint John the Baptist—led to peace between the families involved in the killing of Paolo di Mancino.  Around 417 she finally entered the monastery. 

 

It is reported that when Rita was a novice, the abbess decided to test Rita’s humility.  The abbess asked Rita to water a piece of dry wood.  Rita’s obedience was rewarded by a lush growth that flourishes to this day. Through the next forty years Rita distinguished herself as a humble and zealous religious woman in prayer and in all tasks to which she was entrusted.  She also was capable of frequent fasting and penance.  Her virtue was also known outside the walls of the monastery, particularly because of the charitable work to which she was devoted along with her sisters.  She especially visited the elderly, cared for the sick, and assisted the poor.

 

On Good Friday 1442, as she was contemplating the Passion of Christ, Rita asked to have even a small share in Jesus’ suffering.  A thorn (as in the Crown of Thorns) appeared and pierced her forehead.  Until the end of her life, Rita bore this partial stigmata of the Passion of Christ.

 

Before she died, Rita asked a cousin who was visiting from Roccapornea to bring her two figs and a rose from the garden of her father’s house.  It was January. Rita’s cousin humored her thinking Rita was delirious. Her cousin was astonished to find the rose and the figs and brought them to Rita to the Augustinian monastery in Cascia.  For Rita they were a sign of God’s goodness, who welcomed her two sons and her husband into heaven.

 

As the Augustinians put it: “The dark, cold earth of Roccapornea, which held their mortal remains, had now produced a beautiful sign of spring and beauty out of season. So Rita believed God brought forth, through her prayers, their eternal life despite tragedy and violence. She now knew that she would soon be one with them again.”

 

Saint Rita died on May 22, 1457. A local carpenter who was grateful for the social peace Rita brought to Cascia said, “If only I were well, I would have prepared a more worthy place for you.” He was then healed, making a coffin that held her remains for several centuries. Her incorrupt body remains in a glass coffin in Cascia, Italy.  Beatified in 1626, she was canonized by Pope Leo XIII on May 24, 1900.

Until next week…...Fr. John