Saint Frances Xavier Cabrini is the first American citizen to be canonized a saint.

The Childhood of St. Frances Xavier Cabrini

Francesca Cabrini was the thirteenth child born into her farming family in Mount Sant’ Angelo, Italy on July 15, 1850. Her father was 52 years old when she was born, and she grew up in a loving country home. Her village was about twenty miles from Milan. The Cabrini family was very pious, and so when little Francesca was born tiny and frail, they feared she wouldn’t live and they immediately carried her to the church to be baptized. Both villagers and her family members witnessed a flock of white doves circling the house just before her birth.

Francesca was a very happy child with big blue eyes, and she loved to go with her older sister on errands around the village as a child. She also spent time around the family table in the big kitchen where she would listen to her father read stories about the heroic lives of missionary saints. She just loved these stories and when she was playing with her dolls, she would re-enact these stories.

School Days and Applying to Convent

When Francesca turned thirteen, she was sent to a school run by the Daughters of the Sacred Heart. She graduated from there when she was 18 years old and then applied for admission into the convent. She wanted to one day be sent to Asia to teach as a missionary. She was very disappointed when the Daughters of the Sacred Heart rejected her application because she had poor health and they felt she was too weak to do that. So instead, Francesca became a teacher in a village school nearby. She again applied to the convent when her health had improved, but she was turned down again.

Serving Orphans

Father Antonio Serrati, the rector of the parish had great confidence in Francesca, who was now in her early 20s. He asked her to take over and run the House of Providence orphanage in a neighboring town, which she did for six years. During her time there she took her vows as a nun and became the Mother Superior over the seven nuns that she had trained.

New Missionary Order

When the orphanage closed, Mother Cabrini’s bishop asked her to found a new missionary order. Mother Cabrini named her order the Missionary Sisters of the Sacred Heart and she gave them a habit that was practical to wear for all their daily tasks. She and her nuns moved into a new house in Cadogno, where they cared for orphans, ran a school, and did needlework. Over the next seven years she had many more young ladies asking to become nuns in her order and she founded seven more institutions, staffing them with the nuns she had trained.

Meeting the Pope

In 1887, when she was in her late 30s, Mother Cabrini went to Rome to see the Pope Leo XIII, and he received her and blessed the work of her order. She wanted to do missionary work in Asia, but he told her, “Not to the East, but to the West.”

New York City

In early 1889 she left Italy with six nuns and set off to New York City to help Archbishop Corrigan. Mother Cabrini had written him a letter but he was not prepared when she arrived, and he thought she may want to return to Italy. She refused to return because the pope had sent her.

Mother Cabrini and her daughters spent their first night a tenement in the ghetto. They stayed up that night to pray because they just couldn’t sleep in those beds. Then next morning they all went to Mass. These brave nuns wanted to get to work right away, and when a wealthy Italian woman gave them enough money to buy a house, they filled it very quickly with orphans. There were so many orphans that the nuns took to begging in the streets for food, clothing, or money to take care of them all.

Serving the Immigrants

The immigrants in New York had many needs. They were living in overcrowded slums, had the roughest and most dangerous jobs, and had sacrificed both church and family life to make it in their new homeland. The sisters helped them in many ways. They opened an orphanage, a school, and a hospital.

They were so successful, other cities in America were asked for Mother Cabrini’s help. She went to several countries and founded schools, orphanages, and hospitals like: Nicaragua, Argentina, Paris, England, Spain, and Brazil. She also carried out missionary work in New Orleans, Neward, Scranton, Chicago, Denver, Seattle, and Los Angeles, too. She eventually founded 67 schools, orphanages, and hospitals around the world.

Devotion to the Sacred Heart of Jesus

Mother Cabrini had a very warm, friendly personality and she had a deep devotion to the Sacred Heart of Jesus. Her love for Jesus gave her a deep love for the poor. She wanted to help people, especially children. This inspired many people around her and helped her to raise money to found so many schools, orphanages, and hospitals. Always she would begin any job with prayer, and she trusted Jesus. On many occasions the funding would come at the last minute in the most unexpected way for her various projects.

When Mother Cabrini was 59 years old, she became an American citizen. Even at this age she was still traveling around the world, leading and encouraging her daughters who were working diligently in various schools, orphanages, and hospitals. They loved her and described her as understanding and very humble. Even into her sixties, Mother Cabrini still traveled a lot, and this was tough on her.

In 1917 when World War I broke out, Mother Cabrini fell ill in Chicago after a trip to the West Coast. Despite being sick, she continued to make preparations for a children’s Christmas party in the hospital. She suffered a sudden heart attack and passed away on December 22, 1917 at the age of sixty-seven. She was beatified in 1929 and declared a saint on July 7, 1946. Saint Frances Xavier Cabrini is buried under the altar of the chapel of Mother Cabrini High School in New York City. Four years later she was named the Patroness of Immigrants.