OUR LADY OF THE ROSE

Day 305: March 13

Our Lady of the Rose, San Vito al Tagliamento, Pordenone, Italy



On February 2, 1655, the feast of the Presentation of Jesus in the Temple, most of the Giacomuzzi family was in church for religious services. Mariute, an eight-and-a-half-year-old daughter, suffering from epileptic disease, had stayed at home with her aunts. Suddenly the aunts saw Mariute's face staring at the image of the Virgin and, as the girl approached the Madonna painted on the wall, her face lit up happily, as if in ecstasy. The aunts, surprised by what was happening before their eyes, waited for the girl to recover from that state of kidnapping and then immediately overwhelmed her with questions: who? How? Why? What did you see? Mariute, with unusual language, for her who was suffering from a transient disease, reported the words of the apparition, with great serenity and sweetness: "I am not well in this place where people blaspheme against my Son. Tell your father to repent and have me transported to a church on a busy street. Also warn the inhabitants of the area to abstain from the sin of blasphemy. Because of this enormous impiety your countryside has been devastated by hail in recent years, and still more terrible chastisements are hanging over your heads. Do what I tell you, and from this day on you will no longer be exposed to the attacks of the evil that has harassed you until now."

Mariute's father, Giacomo, having learned of the apparition of the Virgin to his daughter, suddenly cured of the illness that had afflicted her since birth, felt the need to talk about it with the curate of Rosa first and then with the old parish priest of Pieve di Rosa, but both dismissed him in a bad way, not believing his story. On the other hand, the one who believed him was a Franciscan priest, Father Vitale Vitali, who came from Rome to San Vito to give Lenten sermons. The latter, having made his prudent investigations into the apparition and the events of Rosa, concluded that "the Blessed Virgin had appeared and had spoken to the girl Maria Giacomuzzi about Rosa."

Hence the decision to transport the miraculous image to San Vito. It was the evening of March 31, 1655, when a wagon was set up for transport. Giacomuzzi himself yoked a pair of oxen from his stable there. When they began their journey, the sun was close to setting: the parish priest and the people, with banners and torches, followed the cart in a devout pilgrimage. The image, according to Father Vitale Vitali, was also escorted by three Angels in heaven, which looked like three lit torches.

Miraculous events immediately occurred: "Today," Father Vitali wrote to the Bishop of Concordia, "April 3, 1655, a cripple with crutches came from St John. After praying to this Virgin, he was healed in the presence of many people." The miracle is depicted in one of the panels in the frame of this print from 1600, the oldest in the Sanctuary. The church of "San Nicolò extra muros" (outside the walls of San Vito) was a small building of cobblestones and bricks, consisting of a rectangular hall and a semicircular apse. It was built, according to some, around the year 1000, for others later, between 1280 and 1310. In 1482 a new apse and a new wall were built and, on the front, a portico.


St Justin Russolillo Writes...

"You are truly the most beautiful crowns of glory for the Father, Son and Holy Spirit! The Blessed Trinity crown you with Its own Divine Glory, O Daughter, Mother, Spouse of the Lord, totally immersed in God!"

(Justin Russolillo, Spirit of Prayer, trans. Louis Caputo, Vocationist Fathers, Newark, 1996, p. 160)

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