Beatification of María Concepción Cabrera “Conchita”: a woman before her time

Today in the Shrine of Our Lady of Guadalupe, in Mexico City, Mexico, Cardinal Giovanni Angelo Becciu, prefect of the Congregation for the Causes of Saints, presided at the Holy Mass for the beatification of María Concepción Cabrera (1882-1937), popularly known as “Conchita”. A wife, mother and inspirer of religious institutes and apostolic initiatives, she also considered the sanctification of priests as a mission.

In his homily, the cardinal emphasized the importance and current relevance of Conchita’s mission in these times, in which the Church is experiencing moments of turbulence and injury, and defined her as a “woman of prayer and apostolic zeal who, before her time, found in herself the moral strength to impose herself as a leader in the social field and in the ecclesial environment. … She appears to us today … as a model of apostolic life: she prays and acts, has her mind fixed upon heaven and her eyes turned to the earth; she worships and exalts the greatness of God and is concerned with the poverty and needs of man”.

95th World Day of the Catholic University of the Sacred Heart

Cardinal Secretary of State Pietro Parolin has sent a message to Archbishop Mario Delpini, president of the “Giuseppe Toniolo” Institute for Higher Education, Milan, for the 95th World Day of the Catholic University of the Sacred Heart on 5 May.

The cardinal commented that formation was one of the central themes of the Synod of Bishops on “Young people, faith and vocational discernment”, held last October in the Vatican, and that young people themselves ask to be accompanied in their human, cultural and spiritual growth. The “Giuseppe Toniolo” Institute has carried out this task for almost a century, in continual expansion “thanks to the intelligent and generous effort of all the members of the university community, the trust and esteem of the students and their families, and the closeness and support of the ecclesial community”, and requiring the strengthening of “the identity of the Athenaeum and its capacity to offer itself as an outbound missionary university”.

“In effect, its Catholic stamp, far from being a cause of limitations, constitutes a formidable opening to the universal search for truth and goodness, offers a consolidated paradigm for the reception and care of students, encourages constant effort also in view of its mission, to build the common good and face the great challenges of our time, especially in relation to the environment, human mobility, and the various forms of discrimination, injustice and poverty”.