Heavenly music comforts Elisabetta Picenardi on her deathbed

Synthèse :

Born in 1428 in Cremona into a local aristocratic family, Bartholomea Picenardi grew up in Mantua, where her father had joined the court of the Gonzagas, rulers of the city. Like her sister Orsina, she received a solid religious education from their mother, Paola Nuvoloni. But when Paola Nuvoloni died prematurely, the girls were brought up by their father, whose main concern was to give them a good intellectual education, teaching them Latin, and a social life, in preparation for the rich and noble marriage he wanted for them.

While Orsina, the youngest, agreed to marry, Bartholomea refused, insisting that she had vowed her virginity to God out of a desire to imitate Our Lady. Bartholomea went every day to the church of San Barnaba in Mantua, managed by the Servites of Mary, to pray at length, go to confession, attend Mass and receive Communion. Attracted by the spirituality of the congregation, in 1448 she asked to join the Third Order, i.e. to associate herself with the various practices of piety and renounce worldly pleasures, while remaining at home. Although she was not a nun, a Mantellata - as the women of the Third Order were called because of the large cloak they wore, a sign of their consecrated state - was expected to attend services, pray and perform works of charity, since she was not cloistered. Young girls, inspired by her example, decided to follow her and share her life.

Elizabeth never left her father's house, except to look after the poor, whom she served with devotion. After his death in 1465, she moved to the home of her brother-in-law, Bartolomeo Gorni, husband of her sister Orsina. In both houses, she occupied a room that she had transformed into a cell, depriving herself of all comforts. Elizabeth was said to be able to obtain many graces through Our Lady's intercession, as well as having the gift of prophecy. As proof of the esteem in which she was held by her confessor, Father Barnabas, at a time when frequent communion was almost non-existent and tertiaries were only allowed to receive communion on the five main feasts of the liturgical year, she was allowed to receive communion every day, after making a daily confession.

Out of love for Christ and Our Lady of Sorrows, the young woman imposed on herself penances, privations, vigils and constant fasts that exhausted her. She chose to immolate herself in this way to join in the sufferings of Jesus crucified, the Spouse she had chosen.

No one in her entourage was therefore surprised by her premature death on 19 February 1468, which Elizabeth had prophesied to the day more than a year earlier. Did her gift of prophecy also reveal that she would suffer cruelly before passing away? Her sister Orsina, who had taken her in, and her companions from the Third Order of the Servites of Mary, who were praying at her bedside, were distressed to see her in such pain, but Elizabeth replied that it was Friday, and that she was happy about what she was enduring, as it allowed her to join in the pain of the crucifixion. And she did, because everyone could see her poor body writhing in the throes of agony. She also declared that the greatest thanksgiving she could give to God and to Our Lady was that they had allowed her to keep intact the treasure of her virginity.

Heavenly music, heard by all those around her, suddenly filled the room where she was dying. Those at Elizabeth's bedside thought that angelic choirs came to welcome the dying woman's soul.

Miracles multiplied at her tomb in San Barnaba, with the result that she became, through popular devotion, "the saint of Mantua". To respond to her already established reputation of holiness, Pope Pius VII beatified her in 1804. San Barnaba having been demolished, Blessed Elizabeth Picenardi now rests in the church of the village from which her family came, Torre Picenardi.

Aller plus loin :

Brother Isodoro Bianchi, Compendio della vita e miracoli della beata Elisabetta Picenardi, Cremona, 1805 (in Italian)

En savoir plus :

• Fra Stefano's video: Beata Elisabetta Picenardi, 19 febbraio (in Italian)