Thursday 2 February 2017

Bl. Elizabeth Canori Mora


This truly admirable servant of God, and heroic victim of self-immolation, in expiation of the sins of mankind, was born in Rome, of respectable parents, November 21st, Feast of the Presentation in the year 1774. In due time she was married to Christopher Mora, an advocate in the Roman Court, by whom she had several children. Elizabeth had much to suffer from these, but more especially from her husband. She made, however, such good use of these and other trials, that she rapidly advanced to the highest degree of Christian perfection. She ever had an ardent devotion to the passion of our Lord and was particularly penetrated with the mystery of the Ecce Homo, behold the man. The Stations of the Cross were the exercise of her special predilection. On Christmas day Elizabeth saw in a vision our infant Savior in the cradle, drenched in his blood. She was given to understand that he suffered all this through the negligence of Christian parents and of those who are charged with the education of children, and neglect this grave duty of Religion. On the feast of the Purification February 2nd, our blessed Lady presented to her servant his divine Son wounded and bleeding profusely, and said to her: "Behold, my daughter, how wounded he is. Oh! Hide him in thy heart." The most holy Mother of our Lord exhorted Elizabeth to offer often the sacred blood of her divine Son, to the Eternal Father, to obtain the conversion of sinners, and the salvation of souls, to whose welfare she was so ardently devoted. Our blessed Lady added: "Join with this offering, my daughter, that of thy sufferings and trials with the love with which thy heart is penetrated." These heavenly visions and exhortations enkindled in her heart, a most ardent desire of offering herself as a victim for the satisfaction of divine justice, and for the conversion of sinners and infidels. Her generous offer was accepted. She was made to suffer in a sensible manner, a real crucifixion when her side and heart were really pierced with a lance. Her sufferings were excessive. She felt that she was dying when our Lord appeared to her and detached her from the cross, praising and consoling her for her generosity. She was in an instant restored to perfect health. Elizabeth received also the Crown of Thorns. God through her prayers, and meritorious sufferings, converted many sinners, and delivered the Church and the Pontifical States from serious calamities. It was she who cured the young Count John Maria de Mastar Ferretti, the present gloriously reigning Pontiff, Pius IX, from epilepsy which had so far prevented his desired admission into the ecclesiastical state ... Through the spirit of prophecy Elizabeth very likely foresaw the future eminent sanctity of the noble youth. Whilst we write these lines, we learn from a high authority in Rome, that Pius IX is working great miracles. The letter is dated Rome, 8th February.1876. On the 18th of June, 1814 she obtained from God the deliverance of the soul of Pope Plus VI, from the pains of purgatory. He had been dead about fifteen years. He had been an exemplary Pope and died in exile, and a martyr of persecution, yet it seems, he had to suffer so long in purgatory. Can we dear leader, flatter ourselves that we shall escape it? Too many Catholics are under this flattering illusion. In the year 1820, by a special inspiration of God, Elizabeth became a member of the Third Order of the Reformed and Barefooted Trinitarians. She died in Rome, 5th of February, 1825, in great odor of sanctity. The process of her beatification is progressing favorably. (See Voix Prophetiques. Vol 2, Chap 13)