On February 2, 2019, the Feast of the Presentation of the Lord, the Oblate Sisters of the Sacred Heart of Jesus celebrated the 125th anniversary of their foundation. The year 2019 has special significance for all involved for it marks the 70th anniversary of the sisters’ arrival in America and the 75th anniversary of the diocese itself. In honor of the occasion, Holy Mass was celebrated by Most Rev. George V. Murry, S.J., in Our Lady of Mount Carmel Basilica in Youngstown, Ohio. Carried in the Procession was a Mercy Cross, one of 33 pilgrim crosses blessed by Pope Francis for the Jubilee Year of Mercy.
The Oblates Sisters were founded on February 2, 1894 by Bl. Mother Maria Teresa Casini in Grottaferrata, Italy. Their foundress, when she was only 18 years old, experienced Jesus showing her His pierced heart “and asked me to share in His suffering.” Originally a cloistered community dedicated to prayer and sacrifice in atonement to the heart of Jesus for the human failings of priests, they eventually established schools for young people to help them spiritually and to cultivate vocations to the priesthood.
The charism of the Oblate Sisters is to console the Pierced Heart of Jesus through prayer and reparation. They live this through the daily offering of themselves, by caring for elderly priests and by collaborating with pastors in parish ministry, schools, and religious education programs, instilling in those they serve a love of God and an openness to God’s vocational call. Two hundred Oblate Sisters serve in six countries (Italy, United States, Brazil, India, Guinea-Bissau, Peru) on five continents. Ministry in the United States began in 1949 in the Diocese of Youngstown and in 2015 in the Diocese of Joliet in Illinois.
Mother Maria Teresa was beatified in 2015 in the piazza in front of the Cathedral of St. Peter the Apostle in Frascati, Italy, where she was baptized. Pope Francis declared, “She was a contemplative woman and missionary; she made her life an offering of prayer and concrete charity in support of priests. Let us thank the Lord for her witness.”
Reflecting on this anniversary, their General Superior, Mother M. Arcangela Martino, said: “Remembering does not mean simply to remember facts from the past, but actualizing, today, the events that ‘happened’ at the origin of our history in order to continue to live the charism given by the Spirit to our Blessed Mother Teresa.”
The thought and the desire of consoling the pierced Heart of Jesus should always be alive in the Oblate…love and sorrow drove Jesus to make His voice heard in the depths of our heart, and this love and sorrow cause Him to desire and to want holiness in the priests dear to Him. He wants the Oblate to sacrifice herself, to pray, to supplicate, to work and grow weary for the sanctification of these dear people…He loves these souls with an immense love…His Heart seeks out people who will pray, suffer and make reparation for them. ―Bl. Maria Teresa Cassini
Villa Maria Teresa, 50 Warner Road, Hubbard, OH 44425
E-Mail: vmtoblate@aol.com