⛪ Saint of the Day : February 11
⛪ Born :
12 February 1878 in Valdemorillo, LeΓ³n, Spain
⛪ Died :
11 February 1937 in Vistillas, Madrid, Spain
⛪ Beatified :
27 October 2013 by Pope Benedict XVI
In the land of bread and wine in the district of Campos, Gaudencia was born on February 12th, 1878 in Valdemorilla (LeΓ³n). Her parents, Felipe and Γngela were good Christian spouses and parents. They had twelve children, seven of whom survived. Gaudencia was the second oldest and she was baptized on the day after her birth in the parish church of San Martin. Her infancy and adolescence were developed in the midst of a rural environment where the family worked together and prayed together.
She learned to read and write and attended the village primary school. She participated in Sunday Mass at the parish church where she also learned the catechism and prepared the Church for Sunday liturgy. Together with her parents and brothers and sisters she went to pray at the hermitage of Santo Cristo and this was the origin of her devotion to the passion of Christ. Her sister, Delfina, said that Gaudencia was very pious and that everyone loved her because she was good and helpful toward others. She remained at home until she was twenty years old and during that time she helped her parents and siblings in domestic tasks as well as with work in the fields.
In the neighboring town of Mayorga de Campos (Valladolid) there was a community of the Daughters of Charity whose members ministered in a small hospital and the school of the Miraculous Medal (they had ministered there since 1886). It was there that Gaudencia met the Sisters and because she was sensitive to the needs of others, she experienced the Lord’s call.
She decided to respond to this call and requested entrance into the Company of the Daughters of Charity. She was sent to the Provincial Hospital of Valladolid for her postulancy and it was there that she began her life as a Daughter of Charity with hope and uncertainty but nonetheless determined to clothe herself in the spirit of the Sisters.
When she completed her postulancy she entered the Seminary on January 19th, 1899. She was received by Sister Cristina Jovellar … her formators were Sister Cecilia Γlvaro (director of the Seminary) and Sister Justa Dominguez (taught history and general culture). Little by little she learned the beauty of the Vincentian charism and cultivated the habit of prayer and silence that was necessary for reflection and the study of the gospels and the Rules of the Company.
Her first assignment was at the Provincial Hospital of Albacete where the Sisters had cared for the infirm since 1864. The community received her and helped her overcome those initial difficulties. She remained there for twelve years and was happy to be able to serve the infirm. She had acquired experience in the hospital of Valladolid and her ministry in Albacete was not very different. There she prepared for vows and reaffirmed the total gift of herself to God on February 2, 1904. She then offered to go to the missions.
Her request was accepted and in 1911 she was sent to Puerto Rico where she ministered in several places. After a few days rest at the Casa de Convalencencia she became integrated into the community at the school of the Immaculate Conception in Santurce. She engaged in her educational ministry with joy and passion. She was very diligent in her work, pious and enjoyed good health during the years of her youth.
In 1914 she was sent to the school of the Miraculous Medal in MayagΓΌez where students, in addition to attending classes, were also able to obtain lodging. There she taught religion, civics and social skills. In 1916 she was assigned to the Orphanage in Ponce (today, the Colegio de la Sagrada Familia). There she cared for the orphaned and needy girls. Her mission was to teach them the work that was involved in carrying for a home, work that was appropriate for their status as women, so that when they reached the age of eighteen they could be employed in factories or workshops or the homes of other families. She remained there until 1933 when she had to return to Spain for health reasons.
Sister Gaudencia had been diagnosed with a heart problem, intestinal tuberculosis and a throat infection. As a result of this condition she returned to Spain for treatment. Her condition required her to be near the General Hospital in Madrid where she received delicate treatment in an on-going manner. When she returned to Spain she had a short stay at the Charity Center in Valladolid.
Then she spent several months recovering in the house of San Cayetano in Madrid where she was cared for … slowly she became better. As she recovered her health she requested an assignment and at the end of 1934 she was sent to the Asilo de JesΓΊs (an orphanage) on calle Albuquerque in Madrid. Here each day approximately one hundred transient poor persons were given a meal. This was a service that Sister Gaudencis became responsible for and showed herself to be very capable, especially with her attitude of acceptance, listening and understanding. Her companions were in agreement when they spoke about her as a humble woman with a simple faith and great confidence in Divine Providence … one who had developed the art of listening. Her family has preserved as relics some letters that they received from her and some pictures that she had painted on cloth.
When she arrived in Madrid from Puerto Rico she became aware of the anti-religious environment. The school-asylum of the NiΓ±o JesΓΊs in Albuquerque was a focus of persecution. The national periodical library has preserved an article, Un atropello mas (One More Abuse), that was published on July 21, 1931 in El Debate which described a violent attack against a group of former students who were meeting to plan a celebration for the end of the scholastic year. Four former students were arrested and the Sisters were threatened. Sister Gaudencia entered the local community there in the midst of this situation. The community received her and helped her until the time when the republican government seized their house and expelled them. She said that she felt that she was going to die as a martyr and that she would like to die singing the Magnificat and praying the rosary.
On the afternoon of July 20, 1936 a group of extremists who had threatened the Sisters placed a red flag on top of their house signaling the fact that the school-asylum belonged to them. The radicals then demanded the immediate departure of the children and the Sisters. Calmly the Sisters began to place the children in other centers that appeared to be safe and then the Sisters took up residence in boarding houses or private residences. The former house of the Sisters became a center of anarchist activity. According to the information in the catalog of the secret police in Madrid (1936) the secret police established their offices (Casa MΓ‘ximo Gorki) in the crypt of the chapel.
The violent expulsion of the community aggravated the health of Sister Gaudencia. The superior, Sister Florentina JaΓ©n and some other Sisters who were aware of Sister Gaudencia’s condition lived in rooms at the same boarding house that was located at #10 Plaza de Las Cortes. They remained there until September 22, 1936. During those months Sister Florentina died and the condition of Sister Gaudencia became more critical. At that time a relative of one of the Sisters who was very well known to them offered them the possibility of renting a more comfortable house and also offered to help them obtain a pass that would allow them to travel freely back and forth to the General Hospital.
The Sisters trusted this man and gave him the little money they had so that he could rent the rooms for them. When the man came to look for them, instead of accompanying them to their new rooms, he brought them to prison, but only after he had robbed them of everything. They never suspected that this individual was one of the leaders of the Popular Front that had established a committee in Vallecas.
Deceived, and now instead of being offered a safe conduct pass to go to the hospital, the Sisters were led by this individual to the security prison of Puerta del Sol. A few days later they were taken to the prison in Toreno which was located in a building that had been seized from the Capuchins. There the Sisters found themselves in the midst of more than one hundred Sisters from various communities in Madrid and Toledo (their only crime was that of being Daughters of Charity). At the prison the Sisters from the psychiatric hospital in Toledo were responsible for the kitchen and were able to care for Sister Gaudencia (but they had to do this in a clandestine manner). One of her companions gave this testimony: she was almost naked when she arrived at the prison and her tuberculosis had worsened … she had constant diarrhea … we did not even have a shirt that we could use to change her and so we had to cover her with a bag that had once contained grass seeds. This terrible martyrdom she accepted with patience and resignation.
At the beginning of November 1936 the number of prisoners at Toreno had become so numerous that the Sisters were transferred to another prison located on calle QuiΓ±ones. The Sisters from the psychiatric hospital in Toledo, however, remained in Toreno because of the good work that they did in the prison kitchen and because of the order that they maintained in the prison dispensary. The prison at QuiΓ±ones was the second prison for Sister Guadencia. One of her companions spoke about the conditions there: The new jail was filled with garbage and misery; on the first night we were all kept together with no light and no place to lie down on the floor … we could hardly breathe. The food became worse from day to day … a plate of rice at noon, a bowl of soup in the morning and the evening. On November 7th a bomb fell on what had been the chapel and some shrapnel wounded two of the Sisters … this event produced a terrible panic in the prison.
For Sister Gaudencia this situation was a slow martyrdom. Her heart became weaker and her body was numb from the cold. Her legs were covered with sores and ulcers and caused her great pain. The Sisters cared for her as best they could until January 1937 when they were moved once again to another prison, this one located in the hospital that had been seized from the Brothers of Saint John of God, a hospital that was located in San Rafael. One of the companions described the transfer: All the prisoners who came from the prison in Toreno were locked up. What a day when we arrived at San Rafael. We were given nothing to eat and we were all gathered together on the patio where we were guarded closely by the militia … we had to ask them to turn their backs so that we could have some privacy when relieving ourselves.
During those painful months of imprisonment Father Hilario Orzanco, chaplain at the French Hospital of San Luis, visited the Sisters. He had been issued a pass by the French consul that allowed him to travel freely and safely. This is his testimony: What calmness and strength was shown by the Sisters … nobody would have thought that they were imprisoned. Their smiles seemed to say that they had internalized the words of the Acts of the Apostles: “They left the presence of the Sanhedrin, rejoicing that they had been found worthy to suffer dishonor for the sake of the name.” In this way Sister Gaudencia was able to forget her own illness and became mindful of and prayed for the Sisters who were imprisoned in various places … It was painful to see Sister in that condition, deprived of basic needs and treated so inconsiderately. Sister Gaudencia slept on the floor, with a brick as her pillow and yet she was able to instill the other Sisters with hope and resignation.
In the midst of these horrors the Sisters were able to rejoice in the consolation of the Eucharist which a prison officer from the InstituciΓ³n Teresiana in Poveda brought to them in a clandestine manner. He said the hosts were “medicinal remedies” for the nurses. The Sisters consumed the hosts and hid the remainder in a closet in one of the rooms. During the night the Sisters waited for the hour when the guards would rest and then they came together in small groups to receive communion. Some of the Sisters took communion at the bedside of Sister Guadencia, thus they offered her comfort and company in the midst of so much pain and suffering.
One of her companions in prison, Sister Josefa Rivera (30 years old) described the final days of Sisters Gaudencia: Her illness and the improvised infirmary were a true martyrdom. The Sisters who were imprisoned there took turns caring for her throughout the day. It was painful to see her bed: a cot that had been made from some old scraps of metal with a board placed on top of the metal and some straw … her jailers were afraid that they she would die in prison … seeing her weakened condition and her body covered with sores they asked Father Hilario Orzanco to take charge of transferring her to the French Hospital where she was admitted as a dying prisoner and not as a Daughter of Charity. She died on February 11, 1937.
Sisters Guadencia’s prison record shows that she left San Rafael prison on January 24th, 1937 by order of a judge from Madrid and was then admitted to the French Hospital of San Luis. The record also notes that she was imprisoned because she was a religious sister … in fact this is the only charge that she was accused of by the head of the national security division.
In the French hospital Gaudencia met Nemesia, a Daughter of Charity who worked there. Nemesia approached Gaudencia and in a low voice said: Take courage, Sister, I am also a Daughter of Charity. On the day that Gaudencia died Father Orzanco was told that she was near death. He administered the Sacrament of the Sick and sacred Viaticum. Before dying Sister Gaudencia told the nurse Nemesia: I forgive and love all those who have made me suffer so much … Pray the rosary for me because I am unable to do so at this time. Following the request of the dying Sister, Nemesia began to pray the glorious mysteries of the rosary. When she came to the third mystery Gaudencia invoked the name of Saint Joseph and handed over her life to God. That day, February 11th, was the feast of Our Lady of Lourdes and was the second Wednesday of the month. Sister did not die as the result of some bullet wound but she did die because of the inhuman treatment that she received in the various prisons where she was detained. Her imprisonment was due to the fact that she was a woman religious, a Daughter of Charity and the slow martyrdom went on for four months as she was moved from prison to prison.
Because of the way in which the Daughters had been scattered, none of them was able to be present at the time of her burial. Her remains were removed from San Luis Hospital and buried in a common grave in the municipal cemetery of Este. The archives of the hospital omitted the place of her burial and therefore the exact place of her burial is unknown. Her memory has been maintained, however, and she is remembered as a true martyr of the faith and a martyr for the cause of charity.
Source : Daughters of Charity: Martyrs in Madrid
by: Sister MarΓa Γngeles Infante, DC
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