St. Gianna's feast day

I am so blessed that this year I will be able to attend St. Gianna's feast day Mass at her shrine in Pennsylvania on April 28. I can't wait!

If you haven't yet been to her shrine and you are within driving distance, consider making the pilgrimage. It is a beautiful shrine and her gloves are available for visitors to venerate. There are many stories of women struggling with infertility praying for St. Gianna's intercession at her shrine and then becoming pregnant.

For her feast day schedule of events, just visit the shrine's website.

If you can't make it to the shrine, you can still take part in the novena with everyone from your home, and you can also print out and mail in a form with your prayer intention that will be included in the novena said at the shrine. 

I love St. Gianna and I know many of you have devotions to her as well. I really believe she is so powerful, and I need to ask for her intercession more often.

It may seem odd that a woman who was able to have four children is considered a patron saint of the infertile, but she did have two miscarriages and she obviously had an extremely difficult final pregnancy, in which she lost her life. To be completely honest, if I were to meet Gianna today - a mother of several children who had had a couple miscarriages - I probably wouldn't think she was someone who knew what I was going through at all. I would recognize that she definitely had her own struggles, but they would be worlds apart from my own. Still, I really think Gianna, now up in heaven, knows what we are suffering. Perhaps because having a big family was so important to her. Perhaps because she did have some difficulty and knew what blessings children are. Perhaps because in some small way, our choice to follow the Church's teachings on assisted reproductive technology is similar to her choice not to end the life of the child in her womb. And perhaps because now, as a saint, she has greater understanding of all suffering. I don't know. But I know she is listening and longs for us to conceive and/or adopt as much as we do.

St. Gianna, please pray for those of us who are struggling with infertility. You were obedient to God, even when it meant losing your life; help us to surrender to his will always, especially when it is difficult and seems, at times, to make no sense. You loved being a mother, and so we know you can understand our aching desire to fulfill our vocation as well. Please ask God to help us grow our families, whether through conception or adoption, and to wait patiently until our prayer is answered. Amen.