BIOGRAPHY of ST GEMMA GALGANI - Get a Free Blog

In 1899, in preparation for the opening of a new century, Pope Leo XIII ordered that missions should be
given in every city throughout Italy. The Passionist Fathers were chosen for Lucca, and the mission in the
Cathedral began on June 25, and lasted until July 9. It was a great success.
Gemma did not attend the mission from its beginning. During the month in which she had received from
Jesus such an abundance of heavenly favors she had but one desire, to hear Him and His love spoken of,
and therefore she had attended a course of sermons on the Sacred Heart which were being preached in
another church. It was only at the close of the month of June that she felt herself inspired to go to the
Cathedral of St. Martin. But what was her astonishment when she saw that the missioners were clad exactly
as she had seen St. Gabriel dressed! The impression thus made upon her was indescribable. From that
moment, she confessed some years later, she began to have a special. affection for them, and attended
every sermon of the mission.
A few miles outside Lucca, in a district known as Angelo, near Vinchiana, the Passionists have one of the
most beautiful houses of their Congregation. The nature of their work often brought them to Lucca, but
Gemma had never met any of them. In the heart of the city and in the midst of her family, she lived as in a
convent.
Her first meeting with the Passionists had such an important influence upon the course of her life that it is
best to set down here her own ac-count of how it happened:
‘We had come to the last day of the holy mission. All the people were gathered in the church for the General
Communion. I also was taking part with the others, and Jesus, Who was pleased, it seems, made Himself
clearly felt in my soul, and asked : " Gemma, do you like that habit with which the priest is clothed? " And He
indicated a Passionist in my vicinity. It was not necessary for me to answer Jesus in words, for my heart was
speaking with its palpitations.-" Would you also like to be clothed in a habit like that?" Jesus added.- "Mio
Dio," I exclaimed.-"Yes," Jesus continued, "you will be a daughter of My Passion, and a favorite daughter.
One of these children of Mine will be a father to you. Go and make everything known to him."
[Autobiographia, pp. 83-85.]
At that moment Gemma felt she had strength enough to speak-a strength that she had lacked for so long,
and she at once went towards the confessional of one of the missioners, Father Ignatius of St. Theresa, who
was the Superior of the mission. ‘But,' she tells us, 'no matter how much I tried I could not bring myself to
speak of my affairs to him.' What was the cause? Was it perhaps the great crowd that gathered around his
confessional, or was it another attack of that repugnance she had felt against revealing the secret of the
King?
A witness in the Processes supplies an answer to these questions, though not a very satisfactory answer.
'Gemma,' deposed Cecilia Giannini, 'told me later on in confidence that Jesus had commanded her to go to
confession to Father Ignatius, and to tell him everything, even what until then she had kept hidden from her
own confessor. Gemma obeyed, but felt such contraction in her throat that she was unable to speak. She
then went to Father Gaetano. Whether this was by order of Jesus or by her own free will, I do not remember,
and I cannot say.'
Father Ignatius, who died in 1927, was a man of great virtue and left behind him a reputation for sanctity.
Gemma therefore went to another confessional and to another missioner, and with the greatest ease
explained to him, in two or three separate confessions, the story of her life and the heavenly favors she had
received including, last of all, the marks in her hands, feet and side, and how she found it very difficult to
speak properly about these latter to her ordinary confessor.
The missioner listened without interrupting her, not knowing what to say, to the account which the humble girl
gave of the marvels which God had worked in her soul. But her candor and ingenuousness convinced him
that he had before him one of those privileged creatures which God at times bestows upon the earth.
However, he was reluctant to offer an opinion at the moment, and after giving her certain permissions she
had sought told her that he would think about the matter and that on his next visit to Lucca would listen to her
again, but that in the meantime she would have to reveal everything to her ordinary confessor.
Gemma wanted to be a nun. After the last words of Jesus it seemed to her that she now knew the secret of
her vocation. Nor had she forgotten the salutation of St. Gabriel when he called her 'Sorella mia' (sister
37