“St. Frances Xavier Cabrini must have been a flexible soul. Several times in her life, God asked her to pivot in her plans and follow Him in directions she had not thought to discern. But through her obedience, the Lord did amazing things – and now she is honored as the first American citizen to be canonized, and the patron saint of immigrants. In the United States, we celebrate her feast day on November 13.
She was born a miracle baby in 1850, into a world where life was especially fragile. Two months premature, she survived even though only three of her twelve siblings would live into adulthood.
As a child, she would play by a stream near her uncle’s house, dropping little violets into paper boats and watching “the missionaries” float away to Eastern shores.
Her health would always be compromised, and her physical weakness caused her to be turned down when she desired admittance into the Daughters of the Sacred Heart at the age of 18. This must have been heartbreaking – these sisters had been her teachers for years, but they just felt she was too frail for their way of life.
Here was the first pivot – a priest asked her to teach at an orphanage, and she embraced God’s new call. Her enthusiasm attracted others, and soon she had a community of women following her. They took religious vows, and she added ‘Xavier’ to her name after the great missionary priest St. Francis Xavier. Their order was named The Missionary Sisters of the Sacred Heart of Jesus. Her heart, it seemed, still belonged to the Eastern missions.
She asked permission of the Pope to establish missions in China. But Pope Leo XIII was thinking instead of the thousands of Italian immigrants flooding into America – orphans themselves, in a sense – far from home, in great poverty, and without spiritual support. We can image her surprise when the Pope told her, “Not to the East, but to the West.” Another pivot.
Obedient again, she packed her bags, gathered six other sisters, and joined the throngs of Italians heading to New York. When she arrived, she encountered another surprise: the house they had been promised was no longer available, and the archbishop insisted she return to Italy. This time, she held her ground. Certain that this was God’s will for her, after all her other changes in plans, she refused to return. Eventually he found them room at another convent and no doubt became glad he had: over the next 35 years these women would found 67 institutions around the United States and the world, caring for the poor and sick in hospitals, schools, and orphanages. Mother Cabrini, as she was called, was prayerful, resourceful, and an astonishingly skilled administrator. She became a citizen of the United States in 1909, and died eight years later in one of her own hospitals in Chicago.
It would seem that in heaven, she made another plea to go East. This time, God humored her. Long after her death, the sisters of her order would be sent as missionaries to China, and surely with joy she watched them sail away, as she had watched the little paper boats of her childhood.
St. Francis Xavier Cabrini, pray for us, that we may accept the upsets of life when they are God’s will for us, stand firm when they are not, and that we may have the discernment to know the difference. Give us, too, a heart for the poor and needy and the spiritual eyes to see them in our own midst. Amen.”
Love & pivots,
Matthew
Summa Catechetica, "Neque enim quaero intelligere ut credam, sed credo ut intelligam." – St Anselm, "“Si comprehendus, non est Deus.” -St Augustine, "Let your religion be less of a theory, and more of a love affair." -G.K. Chesterton, “When we pray we speak to God; but when we read, God speaks to us.” -St Jerome, "As the reading of bad books fills the mind with worldly and poisonous sentiments; so, on the other hand, the reading of pious works fills the soul with holy thoughts and good desires." -St. Alphonsus Liguori, "And above all, be on your guard not to want to get anything done by force, because God has given free will to everyone and wants to force no one, but only proposes, invites and counsels." –St. Angela Merici, “Yet such are the pity and compassion of this Lord of ours, so desirous is He that we should seek Him and enjoy His company, that in one way or another He never ceases calling us to Him . . . God here speaks to souls through words uttered by pious people, by sermons or good books, and in many other such ways.” —St. Teresa of Avila, "I want a laity, not arrogant, not rash in speech, not disputatious, but men and women who know their religion, who enter into it, who know just where they stand, who know what they hold and what they do not, and who know their creed so well that they can give an account of it, who know so much of history that they can defend it. I want an intelligent, well-instructed laity… I wish you to enlarge your knowledge, to cultivate your reason, to get an insight into the relation of truth to truth, to learn to view things as they are, to understand how faith and reason stand to each other, what are the bases and principles of Catholicism, and where lie the main inconsistences and absurdities of the Protestant theory.” (St. John Henry Newman, “Duties of Catholics Towards the Protestant View,” Lectures on the Present Position of Catholics in England), "We cannot always have access to a spiritual Father for counsel in our actions and in our doubts, but reading will abundantly supply his place by giving us directions to escape the illusions of the devil and of our own self-love, and at the same time to submit to the divine will.” —St. Alphonsus Ligouri, "The harm that comes to souls from the lack of reading holy books makes me shudder . . . What power spiritual reading has to lead to a change of course, and to make even worldly people enter into the way of perfection." –St. Padre Pio, "Screens may grab our attention, but books change our lives!" – Word on Fire, "Reading has made many saints!" -St Josemaría Escrivá, "Do you pray? You speak to the Bridegroom. Do you read? He speaks to you." —St. Jerome, from his Letter 22 to Eustochium, "Encounter, not confrontation; attraction, not promotion; dialogue, not debate." -cf Pope Francis, "God here speaks to souls through…good books“ – St Teresa of Avila, Interior Castle, "You will not see anyone who is really striving after his advancement who is not given to spiritual reading. And as to him who neglects it, the fact will soon be observed by his progress.” -St Athanasius, "To convert someone, go and take them by the hand and guide them." -St Thomas Aquinas, OP. 1 saint ruins ALL the cynicism in Hell & on Earth. “When we pray we talk to God; when we read God talks to us…All spiritual growth comes from reading and reflection.” -St Isidore of Seville, “Also in some meditations today I earnestly asked our Lord to watch over my compositions that they might do me no harm through the enmity or imprudence of any man or my own; that He would have them as His own and employ or not employ them as He should see fit. And this I believe is heard.” -GM Hopkins, SJ, "Only God knows the good that can come about by reading one good Catholic book." — St. John Bosco, "Why don't you try explaining it to them?" – cf St Peter Canisius, SJ, Doctor of the Church, Doctor of the Catechism, "Already I was coming to appreciate that often apologetics consists of offering theological eye glasses of varying prescriptions to an inquirer. Only one prescription will give him clear sight; all the others will give him at best indistinct sight. What you want him to see—some particular truth of the Faith—will remain fuzzy to him until you come across theological eye glasses that precisely compensate for his particular defect of vision." -Karl Keating, "The more perfectly we know God, the more perfectly we love Him." -St Thomas Aquinas, OP, ST, I-II,67,6 ad 3, “But always when I was without a book, my soul would at once become disturbed, and my thoughts wandered." —St. Teresa of Avila, "Let those who think I have said too little and those who think I have said too much, forgive me; and let those who think I have said just enough thank God with me." –St. Augustine, "Without good books and spiritual reading, it will be morally impossible to save our souls." —St. Alphonsus Liguori "Never read books you aren't sure about. . . even supposing that these bad books are very well written from a literary point of view. Let me ask you this: Would you drink something you knew was poisoned just because it was offered to you in a golden cup?" -St. John Bosco " To teach in order to lead others to faith is the task of every preacher and of each believer." —St. Thomas Aquinas, OP. "Prayer purifies us, reading instructs us. Both are good when both are possible. Otherwise, prayer is better than reading." –St. Isidore of Seville “The aid of spiritual books is for you a necessity.… You, who are in the midst of battle, must protect yourself with the buckler of holy thoughts drawn from good books.” -St. John Chrysostom
