The Church Triumphant: Spotlight on St. Gianna Beretta Molla

Happy Thursday all! Today is another installment in The Church Triumphant saint series, and just a few days ago, April 28th, we celebrated the memorial of a favorite of mine, St. Gianna Beretta Molla! Let's talk about her a little bit, shall we? And then I'll tell you why she's so special to me.

St. Gianna is a contemporary saint, she lived from 1922 to 1962. My parents were alive for the last ten-ish years of her life. She was born into a large and devout Italian family, the tenth of thirteen children. Several of her siblings joined the religious life, and Gianna considered that as well, but ultimately decided to pursue medicine as a career, and later married Pietro Molla. She specialized in pediatrics, and was involved in faith-based social groups such as Catholic Action. Her faith was an important part of her life that she brought into her work as a physician, and then as a mother. She and Pietro had three children, when in 1961, she conceived their fourth child. Early on in her pregnancy, she was advised by her doctor that she had a fibrous cyst on her uterus. Eschewing the advice to have an abortion (which would make removal of the cyst less risky) or a hysterectomy, Gianna chose to have the cyst removed and to carry her daughter to term. Following the delivery via cesarean section, Gianna soon developed septic peritonitis and died. This daughter, Gianna Emanuela, also went on to become a physician, inspired by her mother's example. In May 2004, when Gianna was canonized by Pope John Paul II, her husband and two of her daughters were at the ceremony, marking the first time that a husband was present for the canonization of his wife. There is a book memorializing letters between husband and wife, called The Journey of Our Love: The Letters of Saint Gianna Beretta and Pietro Molla. How sweet is that?! (and only $6.99 for Kindle!)

St. Gianna's story touched me as a young woman for several reasons (in fact, my Dominican religious name is Maria Gianna!) She was a lay woman, and let's face it, the majority of saints were religious. I can relate to her very much as a lay Catholic woman working outside of the home, and as a wife and mother. And even before I myself was married and had children, I was so inspired by her example of putting the life of her unborn child ahead of her own. Originally I was under the impression that the mass on her uterus was cancerous, but it was not. However, her being pregnant certainly complicated the situation with removing it, particularly given the medical technology of that time. For her, there was only one option, and that was to ensure that her baby survived. All of her actions were ordered toward this goal. I really admire St. Gianna, and with her countenance so relatable to me, I feel like she's a friend of mine, interceding for me and rooting for me up in heaven. *heart*

Does anyone else have a devotion to St. Gianna Beretta Molla? Do let me know in the comments!

Catholic Book Club: Dominican Life

Happy Wednesday everyone! Today is our official Catholic Book Club installment for September, which is Dominican Life, by Fr. Walter Wagner, OP. You all know that I am a Third Order Dominican, so this is a topic near and dear to my heart. Go get your tea, let's get started!

*procures hot water*

This book is actually a compilation of retreat talks that Fr. Wagner gave to a community of Dominican nuns in Summit, New Jersey. The nuns transcribed and edited his presentations, aiming to retain Father's conversational style with only minor edits for readability. Each talk is its own chapter, and begins with a quote from the Rule of St. Augustine, which is what St. Dominic chose as the guiding precept for his order. Following that, Fr. Wagner expounds upon the selection, discussion the content a bit before moving on to its applicability to Dominican life. It's a very interesting and encompassing Table of Contents (you can see the full sample via the "Look Inside!" feature on Amazon), and therefore I think worth including here:

The Purpose of the Rule
The Rule as the "Other"
To Be Rich
The Sharing of Wealth
The "Special" Religious
Dominican Liturgy
Abstinence in Religious Life
The Contemplative Gaze
Work in Religious Life
The Dominican Habit
Dominican Chastity
Dominican Correction
Dominican Identity
Dominican Bodiliness
Dominican Dysfunction
Dominican Authority
Dominican Freedom

As a Dominican, I found this to be fulfilling spiritual reading. The chapters aren't lengthy (the total print book length is 222 pages, so not a heavy lift in terms of size), which I see as a positive thing. Ideal for a short bit of contemplation each evening before bed. Fr. Wager indeed has an engaging and personal style that comes across nicely in the text.

The thing that I *didn't* love about this book is that I personally find it jarring to read something that feels more like a speech rather than a book. It does indeed read like a transcript. There is still good content there, but I found it a bit distracting. The other thing is that although a layperson can certainly glean lots of good wisdom in these pages (as I in fact did), it does feel like content that was aimed at a target audience of religious. Not everything in the book applies to laypeople. So, that too left me wanting a bit more.

I think that the best way for laypeople to get the most out of this book would be to read it in very short increments, perhaps even less than a single chapter at a time, to really reflect on the material and how it could apply to to a lay lifestyle. As well, the material that is more clearly relevant to the nuns is simply very interesting information for laypeople, an inside glimpse into life within a Dominican monastery.

As a Kindle download, this is only $7.99 and I do think it is a worthy addition to ones queue of spiritual reading, taking the things I mentioned above into consideration. For Dominicans, it really is an essential read, I think. Has anyone else read this book, or perhaps a related book on Dominican spirituality? Chime in in the comments! How can Dominican spirituality be applied generally to all of us in the pews on Sunday mornings?

Do check back in tomorrow for the saint spotlight feature that I put out monthly, The Church Triumphant. And next month, Catholic Book Club looks at a new book on devotion to the Sacred Heart, with Sacred Fire: Practicing Devotion to the Heart of Jesus, by Philip Michael Bulman.

Catholic Book Club: The New Wine of Dominican Spirituality

This month I read The New Wine of Dominican Spirituality: A Drink Called Happiness, by Paul Murray OP. As a Third Order Dominican, this book had a lot of personal meaning to me.

Let me preface my discussion by saying that I'm definitely the type of gal that has difficulty reading spiritual classics and other what I would term "heavy" non-fiction. I do think that I still *need* to read those things sometimes regardless, but my preference is for books that put the material into an easier to digest, lighter style, while still imparting spiritual truth. And this book does that in abundance.

The author starts off by describing St. Dominic and Dominican spirituality, and this information is so fascinating even for non-Dominicans. I think most people associate Carmelites with prayer and contemplation, and Franciscans with simplicity and works of charity, but what do people associate with Dominicans? My impression is that Dominicans are sometimes seen in a harsher light, because they're known as preachers. But by "preachers" we don't mean IN YOUR FACE! thundering at the pulpit, or anything like that. Dominicans are also known for their charism to truth and to study, and I think that this paints us a bit as "old fashioned" nerds with our noses in books all of the time. So I appreciated his summary of Dominican thought right at the outset, and his emphasis on how Dominicans are as relevant today as 800 years ago, and how they are much more gentle in approach than one might assume. He also inserted some interesting little facts, like how the Dominican order has never fractured and split off into multiple groups like other major orders.

The author then addresses three themes that he believes permeate Dominican history and spirituality, which are (1) happiness, (2) study, and (3) immersion in the Gospel, drawing parallels between these themes and a feast of good food and wine. That's certainly a pleasing and relatable parallel, and as such I read this book much more quickly than I would have originally thought. He discusses a lot of Dominican saints and how they exemplified these three themes with their lives and writings, some of whom I hadn't heard of before. Others, of course, are well known to all us, including St. Catherine of Siena, St. Thomas Aquinas, and St. Martin de Porres.

One of the things that I really liked about this book was how accessible it made the saints feel to me. The author discusses their lives and their struggles, and it makes one realize that even saints didn't have an easy time of navigating their spiritual life. There are some endearing anecdotes included about many of them. At the end of the book, the author includes a short biography of each saint mentioned, which is an incredibly helpful reference to keep track of everybody and when they lived.

The author also does a very good job of discussing Dominican charisms in the context of the early days of the order, but emphasizing how these things are still so relevant today. For example, in a discussion of St. Thomas Aquinas and his immense love for studying, the author addresses how study can be a form of prayer, and as such an all consuming desire, a form of the Gospel mandate to pray without ceasing. The final chapter, "Dominicans Drinking" (don't you love that?) is my favorite, and the author really brings home the passion of the early Dominicans for the Word of God. "Holy drunkenness," we should all aspire for this!

I really loved this book, and I'm so glad that I read it. It's not as easy a read as a spiritual memoir, but it is incredibly approachable and accessible for such a topic. It was a pleasure to read.

Over our time together, I will certainly select other books on Dominican spirituality for Catholic Book Club (hint: I already have several downloaded to my Kindle :)), but if there are books on other religious orders/Catholic spiritual traditions that you wish to recommend to me for the club, please do leave a comment!

And so, for those that did read New Wine, have at it in the comments! Leave your thoughts on the book, I'd love to read them!

Next up for Catholic Book Club is Shirt of Flame: A Year with St. Therese of Lisieux, by Heather King. I have this all downloaded by my Kindle, and will be reviewing it on Wednesday, October 23rd. You'll notice that I updated the right sidebar for Catholic Book Club to announce our December selection:  A Catholic Christmas, by Kathleen Carroll. This is available both in print and for Kindle (which is how I'll be reading it) and I'm so, so excited to read about the roots of our Christmas celebrations, other important feast days in December, and related traditions one can practice in their home. This is a shorter book (we're all busy in December!) and I modified our usual date from the fourth Wednesday of the month to the third Wednesday, because I'm doubting you'll all be reading this blog on Christmas Day!

I hope that you're all looking forward to reading these books as much as I am. :)