Blessed Gianna Beretta Molla 1922-1962

 April 28

How do you know if someone loves you?

  Do they give you presents? Do they make you laugh? Are they nice to you? Do they let you do anything you want to do?

  Sometimes we think those things are signs of love. We get angry with our parents when they're strict. We get upset when they ask us to do things that aren't fun----like homework or jobs around the house. We think they don't love us. 

 We're wrong. People who don't care about us at all can give us presents or make us laugh. Love is something else.

 Love is really caring about another person and wanting the best for him or her. When we love someone, we act in his or her best interest, no matter how hard it might be for either of us. 

 But how do we know that that's what love is? 

 We know it because it's the way Jesus loved and lived. We know it because God is love. 

 Holy people are people who show us very clearly what love is, because they love just as Jesus did. They love everyone they meet, and they love the poor and the unwanted. They love the whole world, and they start with their own families. 

 In Italy not too long ago, a mother loved her children with Jesus' kind of love. Her name was Gianna Beretta Molla. 

 Gianna came from a large, happy family. Her parents taught her to love God and to serve God with whatever talents God had given her. Early on, Gianna decided that she wanted to serve God and God's people as a doctor.

 So Gianna went to medical school. After she graduated, she set up a practice with her brother. They began treating the sick, especially children and poor people. 

 After many years of happily practicing medicine, Gianna married a man named Pietro, and they started having children. The babies came very quickly----first a boy, then a girl, then another girl. Gianna----mother, doctor, and wife----was very happy. 

 In 1961, Gianna found out that she was going to have another baby. She and her husband were overjoyed. But soon, bad news arrived. Gianna was sick. 

 A doctor told her that she had a tumor inside her, very close to where the baby was growing. The best way to save her own life would be to take much of the tumor out. But that meant that the baby would die.

 Gianna said no. She told the doctors to take out as much of the tumor as they could without harming the baby. After the baby was born, she would try to get better on her own, but for now, the baby came first.

 The doctors performed the surgery. As the months went on, Gianna and Pietro prayed. They prayed for their baby's safety, and they prayed for strength. Gianna was grateful to God for having given her baby. She was willing to sacrifice whatever was necessary, even her own health, to help her baby.

 In April, on Holy Saturday (the day before Easter Sunday), Gianna's baby was born. It was a girl, and they named her Emanuela, which means "God is with us."

 But the doctors had sad news for Gianna. They had discovered that she was very, very sick. For seven days they worked to save her. They gave her the best medicines and their best care. Gianna only got worse. 

 That whole long week, Gianna continued to pray. She prayed for her children and her husband. She thanked God for giving her baby life. 

 Near the end of the week, it was clear that Gianna was not going to live. The doctors permitted her to leave the hospital. She was taken to her own home, to her own bed, and there she died. 

 Gianna Beretta Molla died in peace. Before she died, she told her husband that she had seen what had awaited her in heaven, and she was not afraid. Her heart was full, even though she was suffering, because she was suffering for the sake of love. 

 Blessed Gianna loved the children she helped as a doctor, and she loved her own precious little ones. Her love was special because it was so much like the love that Jesus has for all of us. It was a love that was fearless and unafraid. It was a love that was totally unselfish. Like Jesus, Blessed Gianna Beretta Molla was willing to give anything for the sake of love----even her own life.

 As Blessed Gianna shows us, sometimes love requires great sacrifice. Can you think of people in your life who have sacrificed for your sake? 

 This came from the book called Loyola Kids Book of SAINTS. 

 By: Amy Welborn