The letters Saint Gianna wrote to Pietro Molla (her future husband) display an exquisite holy romance.
Full of love and exuberance, Gianna lived and breathed God’s will. She understood the eminent union of human love and sacrifice. She wrote Pietro: “I really want to make you happy and be what you desire: good, understanding and ready for the sacrifices that life will require of us.”
Gianna gave Pietro a little nudge letting him know of her affection for him. To close she wrote:
Ciao, dear Pietro. Pardon my familiarity, but that’s how I am. Arrivaderci.
With affection, Gianna
Their deepening friendship with plans for future family life together gloriously flowered in vows of sacramental marriage on September 24,1955 promising: “Until death do us part, I do.”
A sample of St. Gianna’s quotes:
Dr. Saint Gianna: ”Our body is a cenacle, a monstrance: through its crystal the world should see God".
"The secret of happiness is to live moment by moment and to thank God for all that He, in His goodness, sends to us day after day”.
"God's Providence is in all things, it's always present.”
In God’s Providence, Gianna and Pietro did “part” from each other; oh so early!
After seven years of marriage, St. Gianna died a heroic death seven days after giving birth to their baby Gianna Emanuela. St. Gianna, so full of Jesus’ love displayed by ultimate sacrifice, adamantly chose to save her daughter’s life over her own.
St. Gianna’s grieving husband, Pietro Molla, wrote this a few months after his beloved wife Gianna died:
“You, Gianna, help me day by day, to carry my Cross, to do, in a heroic way, the Lord's will. Obtain also for our children and for me, the divine grace to become saints. Grant that each day may bring us closer to you, and each day we may climb a step of Jacob's mystical ladder, at the top of which you await us. And grant that when the Lord calls us to Himself, He may find us worthy to come closer and closer to you forever. And so be it.”
We can also begin to write letters to our loved ones, friends and children. It becomes our legacy of love.
- Nancy Miller-Johnson, MD #LiveSMOL