september 4. Rose of viterbo, baby visionary and young hermitess
experiment: |
Patron saint of exiles and people rejected by religious orders
Lived 1234 to 1252 Canonized 1457 Described as a "lowly and unimportant creature", Saint Rose was born of slim means. By one account, baby Rose never cried. By another, she "let out a (figurative?) cry that would grow and grow until it awakened the people to a new consciousness." Even before she could speak, Saint Rose attempted to pronounce the names of Jesus and Mary, and as soon as she could walk, she took "tottering steps towards Christ in His tabernacle." As a little girl, she practiced great austerities, disciplining herself three times a day until she fainted from blood loss. Called to be a "young hermitess" and also a child preacher, little Rose took to the streets with a cross in her hand, decrying Christ's torture and describing the heinousness of sin. Later, she spoke out in support of the Papal State when her town revolted against it. Rose's father--frightened by his daughter's fiery nature--beat her if she so much as left the house, to which she replied, "If Jesus could be beaten for me, I could be beaten for Him." MIRACLES
"VERY POSTMORTEM FINDS" In 1921, 670 years after Rose's death, a monk extracted her still heart to create a new relic. 79 years later--in 2010--the relic was submitted (by whom, I don't know!) to undergo scientific examination by a team of Italian paleoanthropologists. The researchers x-rayed the "teen mummy's heart" and found a blockage there, revealing that Saint Rose died of an embolism rather than tuberculosis as previously thought. This research was made possible by the corpse's incorrupt state, which this article attributes to a unique process of interment reserved for prospective saints and a sealed glass casket. |