Gianna Beretta Molla was an Italian pediatrician, wife and mother who gave her own life to protect the life of her fourth child, a witness to the dignity of life.
Life
Gianna Beretta Molla was born in 1922 into a large, devout family in Magenta, Italy. She studied medicine, became a physician specializing in pediatrics, and cared devotedly for the poor and for mothers. She was active in Catholic Action, and in 1955 she married Pietro Molla; they had three children.
In 1961, while expecting their fourth child, she was found to have a tumor in her uterus. She declined treatment that would have endangered the baby and asked that the child be saved first. Her daughter Gianna Emanuela was born in April 1962, and Gianna died a week later, on 28 April. She was canonized by Saint John Paul II in 2004.
Spirituality
Saint Gianna’s spirituality is lay holiness lived in the middle of family and work. She saw marriage and motherhood as a calling from God and lived her medical work as a service of love. Her final choice was not sudden heroism but the fruit of a love built up over a lifetime.
Reflection
Saint Gianna shows that both home and workplace can be places of holiness. What choice could I make today, at home or at work, that cherishes and loves life?