Blessed Elena Aiello

Who was Blessed Elena Aiello?

Blessed Elena Aiello was an Italian religious sister from Calabria, the founder of the Minim Sisters of the Passion of Our Lord Jesus Christ. She was born Elena Emilia Aiello in the hill town of Montalto Uffugo, near Cosenza, on April 10, 1895, and she died in Rome on June 19, 1961. In life and after death the people of Calabria called her la monaca santa, "the holy nun." We keep her feast on June 19.

Her life joined two things that she thought could not be pulled apart: suffering with Christ and serving the poorest. Her motto, which she repeated almost like a litany, was "non c'è amore senza sofferenza": there is no love without suffering.

A girl of Montalto

Elena grew up in a devout family and lost her mother while still young. During an illness she privately consecrated her life to God with vows of poverty, chastity and obedience. After the First World War and the Spanish flu, in August 1920, she entered the Sisters of Charity of the Most Precious Blood at Nocera dei Pagani.

It did not last. A minor ailment, badly treated, left her with serious physical damage, and the sisters sent her home, expecting her to die. At home she asked the intercession of St. Rita of Cascia and recovered.

The wounds of the Passion

In November 1921 the mystical phenomena began that would stay with her until death. According to the account published by the Dicastery for the Causes of Saints, the sweat of blood and the wounds of the stigmata appeared especially on the Fridays of Lent and on Good Friday. The postulator of her cause, Fr. Enzo Gabrieli, has described how wounds opened on her hands, feet and side, and her face became covered with blood as from a crown of thorns. Commissions named by the Church studied these phenomena while she lived.

These are reported mystical gifts. The Church did not beatify her for them, but for the heroic charity and faith of her life.

Foundress of the Minim Sisters of the Passion

On January 17, 1928, with a first companion, Luigina Mazza, Elena began a work for the least, above all for abandoned little girls. She entrusted it to St. Francis of Paola, the patron of Calabria and founder of the Minims, and to St. Thérèse of Lisieux. The Passion of Jesus was the heart of her rule; the charity of St. Francis in Calabria was its daily horizon. She opened homes for orphans and a teacher-training school so the girls who left the orphanage would have a future.

The congregation received pontifical approval on January 2, 1948, and spread through Italy and to poor regions of Latin America where Italian emigrants had settled. When she met Pope Pius XII during the Holy Year of 1950 and asked whether her work was according to the heart of the Church, he told her: "Your work will not end, because it is founded on Providence."

"The best friends of Jesus"

When people complained that her charity toward the needy and the disabled was exaggerated, she answered, as EWTN News reported at her beatification: "The poor, the handicapped and the suffering are the best friends of Jesus, and in doing good to them, we are specifically loving the Lord."

She was, in the words of Pope Benedict XVI, "an eminently Eucharistic soul." She used to say that the Eucharist was "the essential food of my life, the deep breath of my soul, the Sacrament that gives meaning to my life" (our translation).

Her warning to Mussolini

Among her reported prophecies, the best known concerns Benito Mussolini. During the Second World War she warned that "if the Duce does not save Italy by doing everything that the Holy Father says and does, he will soon fall." Mussolini was captured and executed on April 28, 1945. This is a reported private prophecy, honored by those who knew her but never judged by the Church.

Death, beatification and the approved miracle

Mother Elena died in Rome on June 19, 1961, where she had gone to open a new house. The archbishop of Cosenza opened her cause in 1972, and Pope John Paul II declared her heroic virtues on January 22, 1991.

• Approved: the healing of a young woman, Francesca Bozzarello, from a head injury with diffuse brain damage and deep coma, chest injuries and a fractured tibia, after an accident on April 23, 2002. The medical board judged the cure scientifically unexplained on February 1, 2007, and the decree on the miracle was promulgated on April 2, 2011.

Cardinal Angelo Amato beatified her in Cosenza on September 14, 2011, the feast of the Exaltation of the Cross. Her sisters keep her memory in Cosenza, where the congregation she founded still has its mother house.

Symbols of Blessed Elena Aiello in art

She lived in the age of photography, so most images of her are photographs or paintings made from them.

• Religious habit and veil: the dress of the Minim Sisters of the Passion.
• Crucifix: her life was centered on the Passion; she is often shown holding or gazing at the cross.
• Wounds of the Passion: some devotional images show marks on her hands, recalling her Good Friday sufferings.
• Eucharist: a monstrance or host recalls her devotion to the Blessed Sacrament.

Feast day and prayer

We keep her feast on June 19. See the feast day calendar.

We know of no traditional prayer to her in public-domain form. Her congregation in Cosenza receives prayer requests and reports of favors. Let us pray with her own words in mind: "As the Cross was the measure of Jesus' love for us, so it is the measure of our love for him." Blessed Elena, pray for the sick, for orphaned children and for all who suffer.