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| St. Maria Goretti’s remains are encased inside a glass-sided casket. Inside the casket is a wax statue, which contains her skeletal remains. Her body is not incorrupt, and none of the sacred remains are visible. Nevertheless, the skeleton is complete save for small fragments that have been taken for placement in altars and for use in the Church’s ministry. (File photo) |
MADISON — St. Maria Goretti Parish is one of more than 50 sites in the United States to host the major relics of its patron saint, St. Maria Goretti, as part of the “Pilgrimage of Mercy: The Tour of the Major Relics of St. Maria Goretti.”
The relics will be brought into the church at 5313 Flad Ave. on Friday, Oct. 16, at 8 a.m. and lie in repose there for public veneration beginning at 9 a.m. that day until 5:30 a.m. on Saturday, Oct. 17.
Bishop Robert C. Morlino of Madison will celebrate a Solemn Mass at 7 p.m. on Friday evening.
Hundreds of pilgrims are expected to walk past the reliquary during the 22-hour period. October 16 is St. Maria Goretti’s 125th birthday.
Fr. Carlos Martins, CC, a Custos Reliquiarum (ecclesiastically appointed curate of relics) and director of Treasures of the Church, will lead the tour of the United States with the sacred remains of St. Maria Goretti. She is an immensely popular saint, and this is the first time her body travels to the United States and only the second time she has left Italy.
The youngest canonized saint in the Catholic Church, the 11-year-old Maria Goretti died July 6, 1902, after being stabbed 14 times in an attempted rape.
Her last words on her deathbed were of mercy toward her 20-year-old attacker: “I forgive Alessandro Serenelli . . . and I want him with me in heaven forever.”
The unrepentant Serenelli famously reported receiving an apparition of his victim within his prison cell, some six years into his 30-year sentence. That occasion began his dramatic transformation from being a violent and ruthless man to that of a gentle and renewed soul intent on spreading devotion to God and his saintly victim. In his words, “Maria’s forgiveness saved me.”