Kerala-born Sister Alphonsa
to be conferred sainthood tomorrow
Thiruvananthapuram, October 11, 2008 (Press Trust of India)- Two millennia of Indian Christianity will have its greatest moment of joy and pride when Pope Benedict XVI elevates Kerala-born Sister Alphonsa to the status of saint on Sunday.
Sister Alphonsa will become the first Indian woman to achieve the high spiritual position in the hall of fame and veneration of the Catholic Church.
Winding up the long-drawn process of canonisation which began half-a-century back, the Pontiff would confer sainthood on her along with three others from other parts of the world at a special four-hour long mass and allied ceremonies starting from 12.30 pm IST.
Hundreds of Keralite Christians from different parts of the world are expected to attend the event at the Vatican and share the jubilation.
Live screening, special services and a memorial meeting have been planned in the small town of Bharanangnam in Kerala's Kottayam District, where the self-effacing Alphonsa led her short life of unflinching faith in the first half of the 20th century.
The three others to be made saints are Italian priest and founder of Missionaries of Sacred Hearts of Jesus Fr Geatano Eerrico, Swiss foundress of the Congregation of Fransiscan Sisters of Mary Help of Christians Maria Bernarda Butler and Narcisa de Jesus Martillo, an Ecuadorian lay person.
According to church history, the first Indian person to become a Catholic saint was Gonzalo Garcia, a Jesuit born in Vasai near Mumbai. He died a martyr at Nagasaki in Japan in 1597 and was raised to the status of a saint in 1862.
According to Church sources, elevation of Sr Alphonsa as a saint is of special significance to Indian Christians as she is a 'home-grown' person born and brought up in the 2000-year old Syrian Christian traditions of Kerala.
According to church historians, Kerala is the cradle of Indian Christianity with St Thomas the apostle preaching the faith by landing at Crangannore (Kodungallur) in AD 52.
Alphonsa was born in a family of modest means as the fourth child of Muttathupadath Ouseph and Marian on August 19, 1910 at Kudamaloor in Kottayam district. She was christened Annakutty by her relatives.
She lost her mother when she was three-months old and her life was full of physical pain and suffering which she bore by seeking solace in deep spirituality tempered by steely faith in the providence above.
Since a very young age, she had shown an inclination for spiritual life. According to biographers, during her childhood she once deliberately burnt one of her legs so that she could avoid being accosted by suitors when she grew up.
Her will prevailed when she joined the convent of Poor Clares of Fransican Order at Bharananganam near her village in 1927. She spent the rest of her life there till her death in 1946.
When she was alive, people from the sleepy farming village and the hamlets around used to call on the unassuming nun who would pray for them to mitigate their sufferings. Some of the miracles attributed to her were said to have happened then.
Poster at St. Alphonsa Church in New Delhi.
Sister Alfonsa, Indian saint,
model of Christian charity
by Nirmala Carvalho
New Delhi, Oct. 11 (AsiaNews) - "I always remember her smiling face, all of us students knew that she was suffering from different ailments and was sick, but she was always smiling."
This is the personal recollection of Fr. Francis Vadakel, 72, about Blessed Alfonsa of the Immaculate Conception, who tomorrow, October 12, will be proclaimed a saint by Pope Benedict XVi in St. Peter's Square.
"She was a great consolation to students during examinations" Fr. Francis continues, "she understood the anxiety of children during the exams and was a counselor and adviser to the children."
There was something about her that "made her different from the others," and "grace was visible on her face."
The place where she is buried - the church of Blessed Alfonsa in the district of Kottayam - is still a pilgrimage destination for people who come to her tomb to pray and leave flowers."
"And not just Catholics, but many Muslims and Hindus too, attracted by the purity of her young long-suffering life and by her healing powers."
The baptismal name of the blessed is Anna Muttathupadam; she was born on August 19, 1919, in Kudamaloor, in Kerala, and at the age of 17 she entered the Congregation of the Immaculate Conception.
In 1936, she took perpetual vows at the monastery of the Claretians of Malabar in Bharananganam. Her work was teaching, but she soon had to leave it for health reasons. She bravely endured her illness until her death, on July 28, 1946, at the age of just 36.
The bishop of Palai began the diocesan process of beatification in 1955, and on November 9, 1984, she was declared venerable. On February 8, 1986, Pope John Paul II beatified her in Kottayam, in India, together with another Indian blessed, Kuriakose Elias Chavara.
“This is a great moment for the Indian Church," says Cardinal Varkey Vithayathil, head of the Indian bishops' conference, "God has raised up to the highest honour a person who the world considered useless and sickly. Today Blessed Alfonsa will be a living catechesis that the Catholic Church produces children who are holy bearing fruit, and in a twist of irony curing the sick, the humble one who understands the intimacy of union with Christ through suffering.”
The cardinal compares the life of the blessed with the experience of St. Teresa of Lisieux, in which the brevity of life marked by "physical suffering" is exalted by the "salvific dimension" that is present in faith in Christ, at a particular moment of the Indian Church, marked by the martyrdom and violence against Christians in many areas of the country.
"We live in a time," continues the president of the Indian bishops, "where the world wants to deny suffering and the cross, even the tremendous scientific and technological progress unfortunately are used to get rid to the suffering through any means there are other sinister developments. Some cast doubt on the right to life of the newborn disabled baby, and of others who are incurably sick and old, and of those whose lives - they judge - are no longer useful to society or meaningful to themselves. Due to this we see termination of pregnancy when the foetus is abnormal, and even euthanasia are all the result of the inability to accept this suffering."
The life of Blessed Alfonsa is taking on an even greater value in India, a society where there is still a rigid separation among the castes, and the underprivileged are kept at the margins of society.
"The canonization of Blessed Alfonsa," Cardinal Vithayathil concludes, "should force us to confront the grim reality upon which our success and world dominance depend - all money, power and other attractions end with death, but a live lived in holiness, in faith and lived communion with Christ, lives and continues to bear fruit even after the passing away of our mortal life."
Three U.S. churches named
for Sister Alphonsa
Rediff.com, Oct 11, 2008
Three churches in the United States were named after Sister Alphonsa even before her canonization by Pope Benedict XVI on October 12 in the Vatican, reports the web-based news service Rediff.com.
Sister Alphonsa lived in Bharanganam in Kottayam District in Kerala, India. Her mortal remains are buried there.
Parishioners at the Saint Alphonsa Church in San Fernando in Los Angeles claim that it is the first church to be named after her.
The church was started as a mission of the St. Thomas Syro-Malabar Diocese of Chicago in 2001. Sister Alphonsa was still a 'Blessed' (beatified), and there was no indication when she would become a saint. Beatification is the last step before canonization.
[Modificato da TERESA BENEDETTA 11/10/2008 18:29]