Blessed Olympia Bida: 2014 Daily Lenten Reflections

Blessed Olympia Bida was born in Ukraine in 1903 and died on January 28, 1952 in Russia. Her feast day is April 2. Olympia and another St. Joseph sister got into trouble for facilitating surreptitious religious services and catechization and were exiled to Siberia. She spent more than a year in a prison camp before dying… Continue reading Blessed Olympia Bida: 2014 Daily Lenten Reflections

Blessed Juana Maria Condesa Lluch: 2014 Daily Lenten Reflections

Blessed Juana Maria Condesa Lluch was born in Spain on March 30 in 1862, and died on January 16, 1916. Her family was very wealthy, but she knew from the time she was young she wanted to serve the poor. When she was eighteen, Juana Maria went to her archbishop with the idea of founding… Continue reading Blessed Juana Maria Condesa Lluch: 2014 Daily Lenten Reflections

Blessed Maria Restituta: 2014 Daily Lenten Reflections

Blessed Maria Restituta was born May 1, 1894, in what is now the Czech Republic and died on this date in Vienna in 1943. She entered the Franciscan Sisters of Christian Charity community when she was twenty, taking the name Restituta after an early martyr, and served as a surgical nurse. Maria Restituta’s outspoken nature… Continue reading Blessed Maria Restituta: 2014 Daily Lenten Reflections

St. Gwladys: 2014 Daily Lenten Reflections

St. Gwladys lived in the sixth century in what is now Wales. She and her chieftain husband Gwynllyw were sort of the Bonnie and Clyde of their day. Madly in love, they eloped with the help of King Arthur when Gwladys’s father disapproved the match. They were violent. They were bandits. It was a riotous life… a… Continue reading St. Gwladys: 2014 Daily Lenten Reflections