Today May 22

Today is the feast of dear and misunderstood St. Rita of Cascia. She is the patron, but not necessarily the model, of all those in bad marriages. Yes, pray to her for protection if you have an abusive husband (as did she) but that doesn't mean you should stay with him! After all, the Church provides for this situation:

Yet there are some situations in which living together becomes practically impossible for a variety of reasons. In such cases the Church permits the physical separation of the couple and their living apart. The spouses do not cease to be husband and wife before God and so are not free to contract a new union. In this difficult situation, the best solution would be, if possible, reconciliation. The Christian community is called to help these persons live out their situation in a Christian manner and in fidelity to their marriage bond which remains indissoluble. (CCC 1649)

It may be that there is cause to examine the situation as the marriage may never have existed (declaration of nullity). A saint's help in this difficult time of trial is always welcome. However, we must realize every situation is unique and not necessarily model ourselves on a saint's life without proper thought and direction. For example, this great saint also prayed that her sons die rather than fulfill their promise to enter into a bloody vendetta to avenge the murder of their father. Like Dominic Savio's motto: "Death, but not sin," we can admire our saint's fortitude without actually heedlessly praying for a (potential) sinner's death. As it happened, both her boys were struck ill before they could carry out their sinful plan and were reconciled to both their mother and God. So all's well there. (Her brutal husband also was reconciled to her and to God before he was murdered.) She was then free to enter an Augustinian convent (which had been her wish all along).

She was devoted to the Passion of Christ and was given the grace of a modified sort of stigmata -- a wound in her forehead like one from the crown of thorns. It was a particularly nasty wound which suppurated and smelled bad, so she lived as a sort of recluse in the convent itself until the end of her days, with one brief exception. The wound healed for a time so she could go with the other sisters on a pilgrimage to Rome. She died of a cancer-like disease on this day in 1457, 550 years ago, with roses miraculously blooming outside, which on her direction a sister cut and brought to her bedside (her symbol is roses). St. Rita, pray for us.