BLESSED ANNA MARIA TAIGI
Wife and mother, Trinitarian Tertiary
(1769-1837)
Anna Maria Gianetti was born in Siena, Italy. She
joined her father in Rome when a reversal of
fortune obliged him to go and settle there. The
little girl went to school only two years, and
she scarcely learned how to read. Her parents
poured all their bitterness upon their daughter,
but the angelic little child redoubled in meekness towards them.
Anna Maria soon began working to help her
parents. She grew up a pious, hard-working,
coquettish lass who enjoyed dressing herself up.
Domenico Taigi, an honest but rough man, quick to
anger, who was working as a day laborer in the
Chigi Palace, offered to marry her, and Anna Maria accepted his proposal.
In the early days of their household she kept her
worldly habits, loving to go to the puppet
theater and wear jewelry. After three years of a
life divided between love of God and love of the
world, Anna Maria went to confession to Father
Angelo of the Order of Servites. She was totally
converted, and with her husband’s consent she was
received into the Third Order of the
Trinitarians. Domenico asked for only one thing:
keep the house peaceful and in good order!
But now Anna Maria’s parents came to join the
young household. From the moment of their
arrival, yelling scenes became a daily
occurrence. Anna Maria did her best to quiet them
down, but her quarrelsome mother was always
looking for a fight with her son-in-law, who
flared up very easily. Attenuating the blows as
best she could, Anna Maria hastened to serve her
quick-tempered husband, who was perfectly capable
of dashing the contents of the dinner table onto
the floor when a dish did not please him. After
her mother’s death, her father lived at his
daughter’s expense and heaped dispute upon
dispute. When he contracted leprosy, Blessed Anna
Maria cared for him tenderly and helped him die a Christian death.
Their home would have become a veritable hell for
their seven children, but the Blessed remained so
supernaturally sweet that Domenico later declared
that the house was a real paradise, and that
cleanliness and order reigned everywhere in his
poor dwelling. Anna Maria would get up very early
to go to church, and she received Communion
daily. When a family member was sick, however, to
avoid giving an occasion for complaint, she
deprived herself of Mass and Communion. To make
up for this involuntary privation, she spent her
free moments in recollection on such days.
Blessed Anna Maria Taigi always kept her children
busy. After supper, the family recited the Rosary
and read a brief Life of the Saint of the day,
and then the children went to bed after receiving
a blessing. On Sunday they visited the sick in
the hospital. Her maternal tenderness did not
keep her from firmly applying punishments when
they were deserved, such as the rod and fasting.
Her children profited well from such a balanced
formation, and soon they were an honor to their
virtuous mother and an example to their companions.
Her delicacy towards the humble was exquisite.
She fed her servant girl better than herself;
when one of them awkwardly broke some dishes, she
said sweetly, “Well, I suppose the people who
make the china have to make a living too.”
When she was received as a member of the Third
Order of the Holy Trinity, the Blessed offered
herself as a victim of atonement for the sins of
the world. In return for this generous offering,
God granted her the permanent vision of a
luminous globe or sun, in which she could read
the needs of souls, the condition of sinners, and the dangers of the Church.
This extraordinary phenomenon lasted forty-seven
years. Surprised by ravishments and ecstasies
amid her domestic occupations, Anna Maria strove
vainly to avoid them. Thanks to her, many sick
people warned of their approaching end met with a
holy death. The fate of the dead was revealed to
her, and her compassion towards them inspired her
to multiply her penances to win an earlier
release for these poor souls, who came to thank her for their deliverance.
Although Blessed Anna Maria Taigi fervently
wanted to remain unknown to everyone, a whole
host of visitors — the poor, princes, priests,
bishops, even the pope — flocked to her to ask
for advice from her inspired wisdom. Simple and
humble, she would reply very simply, trying to
avoid praise, always refusing little gifts.
This woman who spread light and serenity all
around her was deprived of spiritual consolation
for five years and had a the very strong
sentiment that she had been relegated to hell.
The anxiety and darkness in her soul had been on
the increase for seven months, and Anna Maria
Taigi underwent a veritable agony, but she
continued directing her house as though nothing was amiss.
Despite the fact that her fingers had become very
painful, she did a great deal of sewing to earn
the family’s daily bread. The wife of the
Governor of Savoy, who had obtained many graces
through the prayers of the handmaid of God,
wanted to give her a large sum of money, but the Blessed categorically refused.
On Monday in Holy Week, Anna Maria learned in
ecstasy that she was going to die on Good Friday.
After blessing her loved ones and thanking them,
she gave up her soul with a cry of joy and
deliverance. It seems that God wanted to show in
the person of this admirable Blessed the
possibility of joining eminent virtue and
exceptional supernatural gifts to fidelity in the
most humble and material duties of the common life.
Pope Benedict XV beatified Anna Maria Taigi on May 30, 1920.
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Lord, may everything we do begin with Your
inspiration and continue with Your help,
so that all our prayers and works may begin in You and by You be happily ended.
We ask this through Christ our Lord.
Amen.
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