Mother Maria Pia Gullini and Maria Valtorta
It was the discovery of the life of the Blessed Maria Gabrielle Sagheddu (1914-1939), also known as Marie-Gabrielle of Unity, that prompted Maria Valtorta to write to the abbess of the convent at Grottaferrata where she was. Mother Maria Pia Gullini (1892-1959) was deeply committed to the cause of ecumenism, for which Maria Gabrielle Sagheddu had offered herself as a victim soul.
A Dedicated Abbess
According to her biographers, Maria Elena Gullini, from the upper bourgeoisie, was considered beautiful, elegant, intelligent, gifted in music and the arts, and possessed a fiery temperament. Her religious life began at the French Trappist abbey of La Coudre in Laval, where she received the novice habit on September 29, 1917. She took the name Pia (in homage to Pope Pius X, whom she personally knew in Venice). She pronounced her perpetual vows on June 16, 1922. From 1924 to 1926, she was the very effective leader of forty lay brothers.
Grottaferrata and the Unity of the Church
Back at the Trappist monastery of Grottaferrata[1], she became its abbess from 1931 to 1940, then again from 1946 to 1951. Her commitment to ecumenism was the cause of her resignation in 1940, then again in 1951. She exiled herself to Switzerland. Weakened near the end of her life, her health did not permit her to resume this role. The cause of ecumenism led three nuns to offer themselves as a sacrifice for the cause of Church unity starting in 1937. All three died shortly after: an elderly sister, Mother Immaculata, and two young Sardinian nuns, Michela Dui (entered the convent in 1933, died July 23, 1939) and, above all, the Blessed Maria Gabriella Sagheddu (entered the convent in 1935, died April 23, 1939). The Sardinian writer Maria Giovanna Dore (entered the convent June 30, 1939) wrote a biography of Maria Gabriella Sagheddu at the request of the abbess. Published in May 1940, it was very successful. Maria Valtorta discovered it in 1942, which led her to become committed to the cause of Church unity she discovered on that occasion (see the specific article).
Correspondence
May 10, 1943[2]
"The Abbess of the Trappists[3] writes to me and I write to her. I am happy to have prayed and to pray thus for the unity of the Churches. I was unaware that people prayed for this. Jesus, my only Master, has guided me, as usual, even in this. Just as He guided me to His servant, Sister M. Gabriella. I really feel that He holds my hand and leads me where I can find the Good or Souls who, already in glory, can help me, through their doctrines of holiness, in my work of sanctification."
February 7, 1946[4]
"Ah! By the way! The Trappist nuns of Grottaferrata sent me Sister Elisabeth’s prayer to The Holy Trinity[5]... You really love me very much!"
January 6, 1950[6]
"Have you read the life of Sister Maria Gabriella, of the Trappist order of Grottaferrata? I have read it. It is magnificent, both for its style and for the account of the reasons that led this young nun to become a victim. If you do not know it, I can lend it to you. It is the ideal reading for this month, which, from the 18th to the 25th, is the Octave of prayers for the unity of the Churches in the one true Church."
Notes and references
- ↑ Commune south of Rome, near Castel Gandolfo. The convent has now been transferred to Vitorchiano near Viterbo.
- ↑ The Notebooks of 1943.
- ↑ Mother Maria Pia Gullini.
- ↑ Letters to Mother Teresa Maria, vol. 1, p. 56.
- ↑ She is the Carmelite Saint Elisabeth of the Trinity (1880-1906).
- ↑ Idem, vol. 2, p. 277.