At the root of the founding of our Institute, there is an encounter: the meeting of Bartolomea Capitanio and Caterina Gerosa.
Two women together: a historic event, which is highly symbolic, remains as a living remembrance of communion that radiates all around a far-reaching source of life and solicits it.
These two persons alone, by love and sentiments
bound more closely to each other than if they were blood sisters,
opened the Holy Institute called SISTERS OF CHARITY…
They were that gospel mustard-seed
which in a marvellous manner grew and spread .
Two tiny springs
that softly, gently joined into one source;
then, little by little, they became a river
which in various places flooded the Church …
not only in our Country, (Italy),
but also in Mission lands,
and the good it did was truly immense!
Communion cannot be built up around ourselves, putting our own person, behavioural patterns or ability at the centre.
Our Saints received it from the merciful love of God as a promise, and they made room for it humbly, courageously and with personal initiative.
In self-forgetfulness, they responded to the strong appeal that Jesus had for them.
In their faithfulness to him, Crucified for love’s sake, they discovered themselves as sisters and also sisters to the poor of Lovere, to the youth, to the sick and the lonely …
they bore everything gladly because their thirst for Life was exceedingly great.
They acted in two,
but the gifts given to each of them
and their personal love for the same Giver,
so harmoniously mingled together into oneness
that trying to separate them would be human short-sightedness
(cf. NSDU 2017 special issue, p. 199-200, 210)