Rita of Cascia
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| Rita of Cascia | |
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| Born | 1381, Roccaporena, near Cascia |
| Died | May 22, 1457, Cascia |
| Beatified | 1827 |
| Canonized | 1900 by Pope Leo XIII |
| Major shrine | Cascia |
| Feast | May 22 |
| Attributes | Crown of thorns, rose, bees |
| Patronage | Sickness, Wounds, Marriage problems, lost and impossible causes, abuse, Mothers |
 Saints Portal |
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Saint Rita (1381 – May 22, 1457), a pre-eminent Augustinian saint was born at Roccaporena near Cascia in the Diocese of Spoleto, Italy. The name is perhaps a shortening of Margherita, the Italian version of the name "Margaret".
She was wife to a rich man named Paulo, mother of twin boys named James Anthony and Paul Maria, and after the murder of her husband and the death her two sons, she spent 40 years as a nun living to the The Augustinian Rule in the monastery of Saint Mary Magdalen at Cascia.
In the parish church of Laarne, near Ghent, there is a statue of Saint Rita in which several bees feature. This seems to arise from the story that, on the day after her baptism, a swarm of white bees was seen around the baby as she was asleep in her crib. They peacefully went in and out of her mouth, not injuring her in any way. Her family seems to have been mystified rather than alarmed. Later, and in retrospect, the bees were seen as representing her subsequent beatification by Pope Urban VIII.
Her parents arranged her marriage, despite the fact that Rita repeatedly begged them to allow her to enter a convent. Rita's husband Alessandro was a rich man of quick temper who made enemies in the region and one night he was set upon and killed, despite having allegedly softened after the birth of his children. Some accounts say that he was ambushed, others that he provoked a quarrel and was killed.
While Rita continued to care for her sons, it became clear as they grew up that they were intent upon exacting revenge for the death of their father. Rita sought to persuade them otherwise, telling them that such a killing would be murder. She also prayed that they would not carry out their plans. James and Paul died of natural causes within the year, begging forgiveness to their mother.
With her husband and sons gone, Rita wanted to enter the monastery of Saint Mary Magdalene at Cascia. She was spurned for being a widow, though, but she insisted several times, and was finally given a condition to enter: to reconcile her family with her husband's murderers. Rita worked hard to get this goal, and after both clans were reconciled when she was already age 36, Rita was allowed to enter the monastery and stayed there until her death in 1457. While she was there, a thorn detached itself from Christ's crown of thorns and set itself in her forehead - hence the representation of a head wound.
She was beatified by Urban VIII in 1627, to whose private secretary Fausto Cardinal Poli, born less than ten miles from her birthplace, much of the impetus behind her cult is due; she was canonized on May 24, 1900 by Pope Leo XIII. Her feast day is May 22.
A large sanctuary of Saint Rita was built in the early 20th century in Cascia: it and the house in which she was born are among the most active pilgrimage sites of Umbria. Saint Rita, along with Saint Jude is a patron saint of "Lost Causes".
