St. Maria De Mattias, Foundress of the Adorers of the Blood of Christ

Who was St. Maria De Mattias?

St. Maria De Mattias was an Italian religious of the nineteenth century who founded the Sisters Adorers of the Blood of Christ. She grew up in a mountain town troubled by brigands, heard a great missionary preach the Precious Blood when she was seventeen, and gave the rest of her life to teaching girls and women in the poorest villages of central Italy. She died in Rome in 1866, and Pope John Paul II canonized her in 2003. We keep her feast on August 20.

Her life

A girl of Vallecorsa

Maria was born on February 4, 1805, at Vallecorsa, the southernmost town of the Papal States, in what is now the province of Frosinone. Her father read her the Scriptures from the time she was small, and she came to love Jesus as the Lamb slain for our salvation. She had no formal schooling and taught herself to read and write.

Her childhood fell in the years of brigandage, roughly 1810 to 1825, when bands of outlaws and the reprisals against them filled the mountains with blood. The Vatican's biography of her says that in her heart a contrast took shape between the human blood shed in hatred and revenge and the Blood of Christ, poured out in love, the Blood that saves.

The mission of 1822

In 1822, when Maria was seventeen, St. Gaspar del Bufalo came to Vallecorsa to preach a parish mission. Gaspar was the great preacher of the Precious Blood, and his missions were bringing whole towns back to the sacraments. Maria watched her town change under his words, and she wanted to do what he did.

Acuto and the Adorers

Under the guidance of Gaspar's companion, the Venerable Giovanni Merlini, Maria went to Acuto, a village in the hills near Anagni, where the bishop's administrator had asked her to open a school for girls. There, on March 4, 1834, at the age of twenty-nine, she founded the Congregation of the Sisters Adorers of the Blood of Christ.

The work spread quickly. By her death she had opened about seventy communities, almost all in small, neglected towns of central Italy, with three in Germany and England. Pope Pius IX himself called her to Rome to run the hospice of San Luigi, and she opened a school in Civitavecchia.

Death and burial

Maria died in Rome on August 20, 1866. Pius IX chose her tomb in the Verano Cemetery and had a relief carved on it of Ezekiel's vision of the valley of dry bones, with the words "Dry bones, hear the word of the Lord." Her cause was opened thirty years after her death. Pius XII beatified her on October 1, 1950, and her remains were later moved to the Church of the Most Precious Blood at her sisters' general house in Rome, where John Paul II came to pray in 1980.

Her words

At her canonization on May 18, 2003, John Paul II said she had been "won over in the depths of her spirit by the mystery of the Cross" and quoted her exhortation to her sisters:

Let us encourage one another to suffer willingly out of love of Jesus who with such great love shed his blood for us. Let us work hard to win souls for heaven.

The pope noted that she liked to call each person she served her beloved neighbor. She was canonized the same day as St. Joseph Sebastian Pelczar, St. Ursula Ledóchowska and St. Virginia Centurione Bracelli.

Why St. Maria De Mattias is honored as a patron

She is the mother and patron of the Adorers of the Blood of Christ, whose sisters now work in many countries. Her hometown of Vallecorsa honors her as its own saint. Teachers and catechists who work among the poor also look to her as a model.

Symbols of St. Maria De Mattias in art

Images of her follow nineteenth-century portraits. Look for:

• A black religious habit and veil, the plain dress of her sisters.
• A crucifix, held close: her love for "the Crucified Love Jesus," as she called him.
• A chalice or drops of blood, sometimes painted near her, for the Precious Blood.
• Girls and women gathered around her, listening: the schools and gatherings of her apostolate.

Her first tomb at the Verano carries a nineteenth-century relief of Ezekiel's dry bones coming back to life, chosen for her by Pius IX.

Where St. Maria De Mattias is honored

Pilgrims come to Vallecorsa, her birthplace, and to Acuto, where the congregation was born. Her remains rest in Rome in the Church of the Most Precious Blood, at the general house of the Adorers. See the feast day calendar for other August saints and the patron saints index.

Prayer to St. Maria De Mattias

We have no traditional English prayer to her that we can quote here. Her sisters pray in her spirit to the Precious Blood. Let us take her own words as our prayer, encouraging one another out of love for Jesus "who with such great love shed his blood for us," and ask her to pray for teachers, for girls growing up in poor places, and for all who honor the Blood of Christ: St. Maria De Mattias, pray for us.