Mariam Baouardy is to the left while Alphonsine Ghattas is
to the right..............
Today, May 17th, in a canonization laden with significance
both religious and political, Pope Francis declared Marie
Alphonsine Ghattas and Mariam Baouardy the first two
Palestinian saints of modern times.
About 2,000 Palestinians gathered in the Vatican's St. Peter's
Square to sing and pray and celebrate their saints. There,
they heard the Pope pay tribute to the way in which the two
new saints experienced the love of God.
He said: Sister Mariam Baouardy experienced this in an
outstanding way. Poor and uneducated, she was able to
counsel others and provide theological explanations with
extreme clarity, the fruit of her constant converse with
the Holy Spirit. Her docility to the Spirit also made her a
means of encounter and fellowship with the Muslim
world,"
"So, too, Sister Marie Alphonsine Danil Ghattas came to
understand clearly what it means to radiate the love of
God ... and to be a witness to meekness and unity. She
shows us the importance of becoming responsible for
one another, of living lives of service one to another," he
said.
Ghattas was born in Jerusalem in the 1840s to a devout
Christian family. She became a nun, dedicating herself to a
life of quiet servitude.
In Bethlehem, she said she began to receive visions of the
Virgin Mary telling her to start a new congregation for Arab
girls, called Sisters of the Rosary.
Ghattas' hard work and her profound devotion led to the
founding of the Rosary Sisters Convent. It was Ghattas'
home, which she donated to the convent to spread
education and culture to those in need.
While Baouardy was born in Ibillin, a small village in Galilee,
also in the 1840s. She was the 13th child in her family, and
the only one to survive past infancy.
Her parents died when she was 3 years old, and her uncle
raised her.
In Alexandria, Egypt, one of her uncle's servants told her to
convert to Islam. When she refused, the servant slit her
throat.
It was then that Baouardy's miracle began.
"Mariam became a martyr, and she went to heaven," said
Sister Fireal of the Carmelite Monastery in Bethlehem. "She
saw the crown of grace, saw her mother and father. But she
heard a voice saying that your life is not yet over and you
should return to Earth."
According to Baouardy's account, a young nun dressed in
blue healed her, cared for her, and led her to the church. It
was, she believed, the Virgin Mary.
Baouardy led a life of service to the poor and to the church.
