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St. Maria Goretti

The Little Saint of Great Mercy

From September to November of 2015 the major relics of St. Maria Goretti made a pilgrimage to the United States.  Named the “Pilgrimage of Mercy,” it was the first time that her body traveled to the USA.

While St. Maria is universally known as the Patroness of Purity, her greatest virtue was her unyielding forgiveness of her attacker even in the midst of horrendous physical suffering, a forgiveness that would completely convert him and set him on a path to personal holiness.  In March 2015, His Holiness, Pope Francis, announced an Extraordinary Holy Year of Mercy beginning December 8, 2015. This visit of the major relics of St. Maria Goretti was an effort on the part of the Holy See and Treasures of the Church to prepare and catechize the United States for this great celebration in the life of the Church.

While the tour is now over, a second tour of the USA is being worked on which is expected to take place in the spring of 2017.  Any announcement pertaining to such a tour will be published on this site.

Pardoning offences becomes the clearest expression of merciful love, and for us Christians it is an imperative from which we cannot excuse ourselves. At times how hard it seems to forgive! And yet pardon is the instrument placed into our fragile hands to attain serenity of heart.

– Pope Francis, Misericordiae Vultus: Bull of Indiction of the Extraordinary Jubilee of Mercy