Saint Who?
Saints Who Cared for the Sick
Blessed Maria Clara of the Child Jesus
Foundress († 1899)Feast: : December 1
She was born in Amadora, Portugal, and given the name Libânia do Carmo Galvão Mexia de Moura Telles de Albuquerque. Libânia had a comfortable childhood in an aristocratic family, but her little brother, her mother, and then her father died when she was a teenager. She was placed in a boarding school for noble families run by religious sisters.
When anti-Catholic sentiment in Portugal forced the sisters to leave the country, Libânia was invited to live with a noblewoman, who loved her and treated her like a daughter. But Libânia believed that God was calling her to pray and serve those in need, not live in luxury. Government prohibitions on religious life forced her to travel to France to make her profession of vows as Sister Maria Clara of the Child Jesus, but she soon returned to Portugal and founded her own order: the Franciscan Hospitaller Sisters of the Immaculate Conception.
Maria Clara and her sisters served in hospitals, cared for the sick and elderly at home, and ran schools and orphanages. While it was her maternal sensitivity, intelligence, and practicality that helped her establish 142 centers of charitable activity, it was her spousal love of Christ and her emphasis on the tenderness and mercy of God that inspired a thousand women to join her order during her lifetime.
Merciful Savior, grant us a love of sacrifice and
tender hearts as we care for those in need.
