St. Rita, come to my aid!
Faithful, loving wife and mother,
Humble, prayerful widow and nun,
Because of my need, answer my call.
St. Rita, come to my aid!
Beautiful rose born
from the Savior's thorns,
Lead me far from anger and hate;
Guide my heart on peaceful paths
with charity to all.
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St. Rita, come to my aid!
Helper, healer, holy friend
Hear my petition (make request).
To Christ take this prayer,
For He is my Lord, my God, my All,
My hope in despair,
My strength when afraid.
St. Rita, come to my aid!
St. Rita, answer my call. Amen.
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NOVENA TO ST. RITA
Novena Prayer to St Rita of Cascia.
Let all know when your prayers have been answered
O Holy Patroness of those in need, St. Rita,
whose pleadings before thy Divine Lord are almost irresistible ,
who for thy lavishness in granting favors hast been called the advocate
of the
hopeless and even of the impossible; St. Rita so humble, so pure, so
mortified,
so patient and of such compassionate love for thy Crucified Jesus
that thou couldst obtain from him whatsoever thou askest,
on account of which all confidently have recourse to thee, expecting,
if not always relief, at least comfort; be propitious to our petition,
showing thy power with God on behalf of the suppliant; be lavish to
us as thou
hast been in so many wonderful cases,
for the greater glory of God, for the spreading of thine own devotion,
and for the consolation of those who trust in thee.
We promise, if our petition is granted, to glorify, thee by making
known thy favor,
to bless and sing thy praises forever. Relying upon thy merits and
power before
the Sacred Heart of Jesus,
We pray: (here mention request) Obtain for us our request By the singular
merits
of thy childhood
By thy perfect union with the Divine Will
By the heroic sufferings during thy married life
By the consolation thou didst experience at the conversion of thy husband
By the sacrifice of thy children rather than see them grievously offend
God
By thy miraculous entrance into the convent
By thy severe penances and thrice daily bloody scourgings,
By the suffering caused by the wound thou didst receive from the thorn
of thy
crucified Savior,
By the divine love which consumed thy heart,
By that remarkable devotion to the Blessed Sacrament, on which alone
thou
didst exist for four years,
By the happiness with which thou didst part from thy trials to join
thy Divine Spouse,
By the perfect example thou gavest to people of every state of life.
Pray for us, O holy St. Rita, that we may be made worthy of the promises
of Christ.
Pray to St Rita and she will answer your prayers
Tell everyone once your prayers have been answered.
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ST. RITA, WIDOW—1386-1456
Feast: May 22
If St. Rita
belongs to that wonderful band of elect who were holy from their cradles,
it must be said that she required every available help that sanctity gives,
to have enabled her to endure the trials and difficulties with which most
of her life was filled! She was the daughter of parents, both nearing middle
age at the time of her birth, and the author of the Latin memoir of the
Saint says that shortly after this event (1386), a swarm of bees was seen
to come and go several times to and from the cradle a portent which was
taken as indicating that the career of the child was to be marked by industry,
virtue and devotion. The father and mother of Rita were themselves very
pious, and from their laudable habit of composing the quarrels and differences
among their neighbours, they were known as the "Peacemakers of Jesus Christ."
Little Rita as she grew up, seems to have acquired a great deal of this
spirit of the supernatural, for she showed little if any inclination for
games, seeking her recreation chiefly in prayer and visits to sacred shrines-an
exercise, by the way, which-granted the proper disposition-brings with
it a wealth of real enjoyment and satisfaction quite wanting to other arid
more secular amusements. This being so, it is not surprising to learn that
Rita, as she neared womanhood, felt that her vocation lay in the convent
rather than in that of domestic life. We are not aware of the circumstances
that led her parents to oppose this apparently obvious course, but oppose
it they did, and Rita submitted, even so far as to please them by marrying
a man whom all accounts describe as exceedingly bad-tempered and something
worse! It is the teaching of the Church that the grace of the Holy Sacrament
of Matrimony, if corresponded with by a good life, works miracles, almost,
in the way of establishing and perpetuating conjugal happiness. Acerbities
of temper, temperamental differences, and all the other difficulties arising
out of the necessary variations of human nature, are, under God's influence,
toned down and adjusted, provided always Holy Mass, prayer and the sacraments
are not forgotten—for "wheresoever two or three are gathered together in
my name, there am I in the midst of them." So Rita tamed her rough spouse,
and for two-and-twenty years lived harmoniously (concorditer) with a husband
who, like most quarrelsome individuals in the days when sword and stiletto
ever sharp, hung from every Italian gentleman's belt, perished in a feud.
Such a death in the Italy of the Decamerone and the Republics, and, indeed,
till well into our own time, usually meant a prolonged vendetta, and, of
course, the two sons of the dead man at once took up the quarrel. Meantime,
poor Rita was in despair, and finding her expostulations useless to prevent
further effusion of blood, she had recourse to prayer, earnestly beseeching
God to take her boys from this world rather than permit them to live on
stained by homicide. The mother's prayer was heard, and the two youths
shortly afterwards died edifying deaths, forgiving their father's slayers
and resigned to God. The way was now clear for our Saint to satisfy her
long yearning for a conventual life. After due consideration, she applied
to be "accepted" by the Augustinian nuns at Cascia, but was informed that
the custom was only for women who had never been married, to be received
as postulants. The time was to come when not only widows were to enter
religious orders of their own sex as a matter of course, but even occasionally
to found them, as in the case of St. Jane Francis de Chantal and the Nuns
of the Visitation. Again did Rita have recourse to prayer, and it is related
that the night following her second great "storming of Heaven," St. John
the Baptist, to whom she had a great devotion, appeared to her, accompanied
by St. Augustine and St. Nicholas of Tolentino, and these three Saints
conducted her to the convent, where the Superiors who had been similarly
warned, received her with great kindness. The new postulant entered upon
her life in religion with characteristic zeal and thoroughness. She disposed
of her family property as alms to the poor, and in addition to the ordinary
mortifications prescribed or permitted by the rule, she added others of
great severity, wearing a hair shirt, fasting rigorously on bread and water
and taking the discipline at intervals. The Passion of Our Lord was her
constant meditation, and while recalling the manifold sufferings of the
Man of Sorrows, she often seemed to be carried away by mingled grief and
devotion.
In the midst of such wonderful progress on the road to perfection, this
pattern to the community was afflicted by God after the following mysterious
manner. She was meditating one day on the Passion before the crucifix,
when she apparently, accidentally, wounded her forehead by striking it
against some of the no doubt very realistic thorns in Our Lord's crown.
The injury caused by the hurt developed into a serious ulcer, one most
painful and unsightly, so unsightly, in fact, that for many years Sister
Rita had to make her devotions alone! She accepted this great trial in
the light of an additional penance sent her by God, and it was about this
time that many spiritual and temporal favours are said to have been granted
to various persons as the direct result of the prayers of this wonderful
religious, the fame of whose sanctity had already extended far beyond the
convent walls. The extraordinary fact, too, that her garden—which, in common
with the rest of the nuns, she had allotted to her—produced beautiful roses
and ripe figs in the depths of an abnormally severe winter, was taken as
an additional sign that the unceasing prayers and heroic virtues of Sister
Rita were blessed beyond measure, even in this world. The last years of
the Saint were marked by a most painful and lingering illness—cancer doubtless—which
as in the case of all her other seeming misfortunes she another means of
forwarding her greater sanctification. At the approach of death, she received
with wonderful fervour the last rites of the Church, and then, as it is
piously believed, at the call of Our Lady, she breathed forth her spotless
soul to God on 20th May, 1456.
The sacred remains long after death yielded a most sweet and refreshing
odour, and many miracles have been recorded as the fruit of her powerful
intercession. The cultus of the wonderful nun of Cascia spread far and
wide, notably in Spain, where she has since been known as "La Santa de
los impossibiles!" She was Beatified by Clement XII, though as far back
as 1637, a Mass and office were granted in her honour by Urban VIII. Finally,
on 24th May, 1900, Pope Leo XIII enrolled her name among the Saints-the
Saints it may be added, whose virtues shone as stars both in the world
and in the cloister.
[Cardi: Vita della B. Rita de Cascia. (Foligno, 1805.) Messenger of
the Sacred Heart, 1902. Roman Breviary: Pro Aliquibus Locis, 22nd May.]
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SAINT RITA, WIDOW—1457 Feast: May 22
In 1381
in a humble peasant home at Rocca Porena, central Italy, there was born
a littlegirl who was to attain a reputation for great holiness on account
of her mystical transports, her austerities, and her long-suffering patience
in meeting affliction. Rita, the child of her parents' old age, in youth
demonstrated a strong religious sense. When the time came for marriage,
her parents forced her to marry an unsuitable person, in spite of her desire
to enter a convent. Rita submitted sorrowfully, and the marriage proved
to be one long torment. Rita's husband was brutal, dissolute, and uncontrolled;
for eighteen years she bore his insults and infidelities. With anguish
she watched the two sons of this union grow up in the likeness of their
father. She wept and prayed for them all three without ceasing. At last
her husband came to a realization of his sinful life, and begged Rita to
forgive him for what he had made her suffer. Soon after this he was killed
in a brawl,and the sons vowed to avenge their father's death. Rita prayed
that they might die rather than commit murder. Then they both fell ill,
and their mother nursed them and brought them to a more forgiving state
before they too died. Left alone, Rita now began to practice unusual austerities.
She finally gained admission to the Augustinian convent of Cascia, persuading
the prioress to overlook the rule that allowed her to accept only virgins.
In 1413 Rita received the habit of the order. She became quite pitiless
in her self-mortifications, scourging herself three times daily. Her charity
found an outlet in caring tenderly for other nuns in times of illness.
The contemplation of Christ's sufferings would send her into ecstatic transports.
A suppurating wound on her forehead seemed to be connected with her intense
response to a sermon on the Crown of Thorns, an emblem which had especial
significance for her. During her later years Rita suffered from a wasting
disease, which was the cause of her death, on May 22,1457. The first life
of this saint was written in 1600. She was canonized in 1900. Rita is joint
patroness of a sodality which exists to venerate the crown of thorns. The
old tradition that associates roses and figs with Rita has the following
origin. Shortly before her death she asked a friend to bring her a rose
from her garden at home. It was not the season for roses to bloom, but
to gratify the whim of a woman who was desperately ill, the friend went
there and was amazed to find a rose bush in full bloom. Picking a rose
and taking it back to the convent, she asked Rita if she could get her
something else. "Yes," was the answer; "bring me back two figs from the
garden." The friend hastened away to the garden once more and discovered
two ripe figs on a leafless fig tree. Rita is sometimes represented in
art as holding these emblems. St. Rita of Cascia is especially venerated
in Spain, and there and elsewhere she has been called "the saint of the
impossible." In all countries persons who have especially heavy burdens
to bear have been comforted and helped by meditating on the example of
this saint, and praying to her.
Saint Rita, Widow. Celebration of Feast Day is May 22. Taken from "Lives
of Saints",
Published by John J. Crawley & Co., Inc.
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St Rita's Roses
One of those who visited her some few months before
her death - a relative from her hometown of Roccaporena - was privileged
to witness firsthand the extraordinary things wrought by Rita's requests.
When asked whether she had any special desires. Rita asked only that a
rose from the garden of her parents' home be brought to her. It was
a small favor to ask, but quite an impossible one to grant in the month
of January! Nevertheless, on returning home the woman discovered, to her
amazement, a single brightly-colored blossom on the bush where the nun
said it would be. Picking it, she returned immediately to the monastery
and presented it to Rita who gave thanks to God for this sign of his love.
Thus the saint of the thorn became the saint of the rose, and she whose
impossible requests were granted her became the advocate of all those whose
own requests seem impossible as well. As she breathed her last, Rita's
final words to the sisters who gathered around her where, "Remain in obedience
to the holy Roman Church. Remain in peace and fraternal charity."
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St. Rita
Our Patron Saint