Leopoldina Naudet | |
---|---|
Born | 31 May 1773 Florence, Grand Duchy of Tuscany |
Died | 17 August 1834 61) Verona, Kingdom of Lombardy–Venetia | (aged
Venerated in | Roman Catholic Church |
Beatified | 29 April 2017, Basilica of Sant’Anastasia, Verona, Italy by Cardinal Angelo Amato |
Feast | 17 August |
Leopoldina Naudet (31 May 1773 - 17 August 1834) was an Italian Roman Catholic of both French and Austrian origins. She was a religious sister of the Congregation of Dilette of Jesus and the foundress of the Sisters of the Holy Family of Verona. [1] Naudet served in the court of Leopold II, Holy Roman Emperor and after his death served his daughter Maria Anna who became an abbess and professed religious alongside Naudet and her sister.
Naudet was noted for her strong devotion to the education of females and assigned her order to the moral and civic education of all girls in Verona where her order was based in. She focused on religious values in the curriculum that her order provided and also devoted herself to the precepts of her order that would receive papal approval months before her death.
She was proclaimed to be Venerable on 6 July 2007 after Pope Benedict XVI recognized that Naudet had lived a model life of heroic virtue. Pope Francis approved a miracle attributed to her intercession on 21 December 2016 and her beatification was celebrated on 29 April 2017 in Verona. [2]
Leopoldina Naudet was born in Florence in 1773 as the eldest daughter of Giuseppe Naudet and Susanna von Arnth. Her father was French, and a senior official at the court of Leopold, Grand Duke of Tuscany. Her mother was the daughter of an Austrian officer. [3]
Susanna Naudet died in 1778 and Leopoldina was entrusted to the Nuns of St. Frediano in Florence. [3] In 1783, she went to Soissons to furthered her education with the Sisters of Notre Dame. Naudet returned to Florence in 1789, at the age of sixteen and became a teacher of Grand Duke Leopold's children. [4] She became to close their daughter Archduchess Maria Anna.
In 1790, Leopold became Holy Roman Emperor. Naudet and her sister Luisa joined the Imperial Consort Maria Louisa when Leopold's court moved to Vienna. In 1791, Archduchess Maria Anna became Abbess of the Chapter of Nuns of St. George's Convent, Prague. Naudet held positions of trust in the institute known as the Beloved of Jesus to which she committed herself in collaboration with the Archduchess. She entered Maria Anna's direct service in 1792 following the death of the Emperor. While in Prague, Naudet had as her spiritual director Father Nicholas Diessbach. [5] She also came into contact with Father Niccolò Paccanari and she favored the Congregation of Dilette of Jesus that he himself had established; the two also worked in the Beloved of Jesus. [3] Naudet took with her Maria Anna and Luisa on 31 May 1799 to make their temporary consecration as professed religious; Naudet renewed it a week later as perpetual vows that bound her to the apostolic life.
In 1800 she travelled to Padua where she met with Pope Pius VII who encouraged her work in the field of education. [5] She visited Padua, Loreto and Venice. In February 1801 she arrived in Rome where she was appointed superior of the Congregation of Dilette of Jesus but the order suffered a fatal split that saw French members establish the Congregation of the Ladies of the Sacred Heart while Naudet had a few members still remain with her; this split also tarnished the relationship between Naudet and Father Paccanari who had fallen into disgrace due to this. [5] Naudet - as a result of the split - moved to Verona where she became a collaborator of Magdalene of Canossa who was the founder of the Daughters of Charity. The pair collaborated from 1808 to 1816.
Naudet desired to devote her life to the education of girls and in 1816 established the Sisters of the Holy Family in the former convent of Saint Teresa in Verona. She found great assistance in Gaspar Bertoni as well as other figures like Louis Fusari (the superior of the Oratorian Priests in Verona) and John Rozaven. [3] She focused the curriculum of her congregation to the civic and moral education for girls in addition to their religious formation and she was known to demonstrate apostolic ardor; she was also noted for her active life simultaneous to a contemplative life. She also focused the curriculum on drawing and languages such as French and English; she also focused on catechism and economics. On 23 December 1833 the order was approved following the papal approval of Pope Gregory XVI. [3]
Naudet died on 17 August 1834 in Verona; her final words: "I want only what God wills!" [3] Her remains were transferred in 1958 to the Mother House of her congregation.
The beatification proceedings commenced in Verona on 8 June 1971 under Pope Paul VI in a diocesan process that spanned until 24 April 1973. The commencement of the cause in 1971 designated Naudet with the posthumous title Servant of God. The Congregation for the Causes of Saints validated the process in Rome on 7 January 1994 and would later accept the Positio in 1996. This marked the beginning of the "Roman Phase" in which the Congregation would evaluate the work of the diocesan process. The cause was relegated to the historical commission; the historians approved the continuation of the cause on 5 November 1996.
Naudet was proclaimed to be Venerable on 6 July 2007 after Pope Benedict XVI approved the fact that Naudet had lived a model Christian life of heroic virtue which he deemed she exercised to a favorable degree. [1]
The miracle needed for her beatification was investigated on a local level and was validated on 12 May 2006. The Rome-based medical board advising the Congregation for the Causes of Saints granted their approval to the healing as being a miracle on 3 July 2014 in what was an affirmative vote. Pope Francis approved this miracle on 21 December 2016. Her beatification took place on 29 April 2017 in the Basilica of Sant'Anastasia in Verona and was presided over by Cardinal Angelo Amato. [6]
Karolina Gerhardinger was a German Roman Catholic religious sister who founded the School Sisters of Notre Dame. Gerhardinger served as an educator in Bavaria until the establishment of her order, which provided free education to the poor and soon expanded in Europe.
Magdalena di Canossa was an Italian professed religious and foundress of the two Canossian congregations. Magdalena was a leading advocate for the poor in her region after she witnessed first hand the plight of the poor following the spillover effects of the French Revolution into the Italian peninsula through the Napoleonic invasion of the northern territories. Canossa collaborated with humanitarians such as Leopoldina Naudet and Antonio Rosmini in her mission of promoting the needs of the poor and setting a new method of religious life for both men and women.
Giulia Salzano was an Italian Roman Catholic professed religious and the founder of the Catechetical Sisters of the Sacred Heart of Jesus (1905). Salzano served as a teacher prior to becoming a religious and since 1865 worked in Casoria as a teacher for children where she demonstrated herself as an apt catechist and instructor.
Maria Domenica Mantovani was an Italian Roman Catholic professed religious, and the co-founder of the Little Sisters of the Holy Family; she established them alongside Giuseppe Nascimbeni. As a nun she received the religious name of Maria of the Immaculate.
María del Carmen Sallés y Barangueras, also known by her religious name Carmen of Jesus, was a Spanish Roman Catholic professed religious and the founder of the Missionary Sisters of the Immaculate Conception. Sallés is best known for being a strong advocate of both genders being equal and a staunch defender of the rights of women, since she made this the focus of her life from the beginning of her entrance into the religious life.
Blessed Maria Pia Mastena - born Teresa Maria - was an Italian religious sister in the Roman Catholic Church. She was the founder of the Religious Sisters of the Holy Face. Mastena fostered a deep devotion to the Holy Face of Jesus and tried to promote that devotion to others in her religious career as a nun. Mastena first desired the contemplative life but was denied this after she entered the convent since it was not a cloister. Instead she dedicated herself to teaching in several Italian cities after having left another convent and another religious order when she deemed contemplative life was not the life she felt God wanted for her. Her labors were dedicated instead to consolidating a new religious congregation which began to grow after World War II until Mastena's sudden death in 1951. Mastena was beatified on 13 November 2005.
Blessed Maria Teresa of Saint Joseph, DCJ, was a German religious sister and the founder of the Carmelite Daughters of the Divine Heart of Jesus. Tauscher worked in Cologne and was removed from her position after she converted to Roman Catholicism in 1888 so founded a congregation in the Netherlands upon choosing the Carmelite charism for her life.
Maria Josefa Alhama y Valera, religious name Maria Esperanza of Jesus, was a Spanish religious sister. She was the founder of both the Handmaids of Merciful Love in 1930 and the Sons of Merciful Love in 1951. ´
Maria Giuseppa Scandola, MSV, was an Italian member of the Missionary Sisters of Verona, also known as the Comboni Missionary Sisters. She served in what is now South Sudan, where she offered up her life in 1903.
Rosa Elena Cornejo Pazmiño, also known by her religious name María Francisca of the Wounds, was an Ecuadorian Roman Catholic religious sister. She established the Franciscan Missionaries of the Immaculata.
Maria Karłowska – in religious Maria of Jesus Crucified – was a Polish Roman Catholic professed religious and the founder of the Sisters of the Divine Shepherd of Divine Providence. Karłowska worked with poor and abandoned people with an emphasis on girls and also tried to aid prostitutes avoid such a life and build another kind of life so used her order to reach out to such people to render assistance.
María Josefa Sancho de Guerra was a Spanish Roman Catholic nun who established her own congregation known as the Servants of Jesus of Charity. She wanted her new congregation to focus on the care of the sick and the poor. She assumed the religious name of "María Josefa of the Heart of Jesus".
Luigia Poloni, religious name Maria Vincenza, was an Italian Roman Catholic religious sister. She was the co-founder of the Sisters of Mercy of Verona which she established with Charles Steeb.
Amalia Streitel was a German Roman Catholic religious sister. Streitel established the Sisters of the Sorrowful Mother and assumed the religious name Maria Franziska of the Cross.
Maria Crocifissa Curcio, born Rosa Curcio, religious name Maria Crocifissa,, was an Italian religious sister in the Roman Catholic Church. She established the congregation of the Carmelite Missionary Sisters of Saint Therese of the Child Jesus.
Carolina Santocanale was an Italian Roman Catholic nun who assumed the name of "Maria of Jesus" and established the Capuchin Sisters of the Immaculata of Lourdes. Santocanale became well known for her treatment of the ill and the poor to whom she devoted her life and work to and was also a member of the Secular Franciscan Order.
Maria Scrilli, religious name Maria Teresa of Jesus, was an Italian religious sister who established the Sisters of Our Lady of Mount Carmel.
Bernarda Heimgartner was a Swiss Roman Catholic professed religious and the co-founder of the Sisters of the Holy Cross of Menzingen. Heimgartner founded this order alongside Theodosius Florentini in 1844 and served as its leader until three months before her death. She had become a professed religious of the Sisters of Divine Providence in 1843 and made her vows in 1844 before establishing her congregation.
Helena Stollenwerk, SSpS was a German Catholic religious sister who collaborated with Arnold Janssen and Hendrina Stenmanns and co-founded the Missionary Sisters Servants of the Holy Spirit.
Maria Josefa Karolina Brader, also known by her religious name Maria Caridad of the Holy Spirit, was a Swiss religious sister who founded the Franciscan Sisters of Mary Immaculate. Brader served as a member of the missions in Ecuador for a brief period of time before being transferred to Colombia where she served as a catechist and evangelizer for the remainder of her life.