Rita of Cascia - Early Life

Early Life

St. Rita was born in the city of Roccapoerna (near Spoleto, Umbria, Italy) where various sites connected with her are at present the focus pf pilgrimage. She had her first child at the age of 12. According to pious sources, Rita was married at age 12 to a nobleman named Paolo Mancini. Her parents (Antonio Lotti and Amata Ferri) arranged her marriage as a common practice at the time, despite the request which she repeatedly begged them to allow her to enter a convent of religious sisters. Her husband, Paolo Mancini was known to be a rich, quick-tempered, immoral man, who had many enemies in the region of Cascia. Rita endured his insults, physical abuse and infidelities for many years. According to popular tales, through humility, kindness and patience, Rita was able to convert her husband into a better person, more specifically renouncing a family feud known at the time as La Vendetta. Rita eventually bore two sons, Giangiacomo (Giovanni) Antonio and Paulo Maria and was raised into the Christian faith which Rita closely followed. As time went by and the family feud between the Chiqui and Mancini families became more intense, Paolo Mancini became congenial, but his allies betrayed him and he was violently stabbed to death by Guido Chiqui, a member of the feuding family.

Paolo Mancini's brother, Bernardo, was said to have been responsible in continuing the blood family feud in hopes of convincing Rita's sons to continue the revenge. It is said that Bernardo was particularly upset how Rita gave a public pardon at Paolo's funeral on her husbands' murderers---essentially nullifying the law of revenge. As her sons advanced in years (one now 16), their characters began to change as Bernardo became their tutor. Later on, Bernardo convinced Rita's sons to leave their manor and join into the Mancini villa and ancestral home. Rita's sons wished to cast revenge against their father's murderers. This right of revenge in Italy at the time was known as La Vendetta. Rita, fearing that her sons would lose their souls, tried to persuade them from retaliating, but to no avail. Her sons died of dysentery a year later, which pious Catholic beliefs claims was God's act to rather take them by natural death than risk living an immoral life punishable by Hell.

After the deaths of her husband and sons, Rita desired to enter the monastery of Saint Mary Magdalene in Cascia but was turned away. Although the convent acknowledged Rita's good character and piety, the nuns were afraid of being associated with her due to the scandal of her husband's violent death. However, she persisted in her cause and was given a condition before the convent could accept her: the difficult task of reconciling her family with her husband's murderers. She was able to resolve the conflicts between the families and, at the age of 36, was allowed to enter the monastery. Popular religious tales recall that the bubonic plague which ravaged Italy at the time infected Bernardo Mancini, causing him to relinquish his desire to feud any longer with the Chiqui family.

Rita's actual entrance into the monastery has been described as a miracle by popular religious tales. During the night, when the doors to the monastery were locked and the sisters were asleep, Rita was said to have been miraculously transported into the convent by her patron saints Saint John the Baptist, Saint Augustine, and Saint Nicholas of Tolentino. When she was found inside the convent in the morning and the sisters learned of how she entered, they could not turn her away.

She remained at the monastery, living by the Augustinian Rule, until her death.

She is well known as the patron saint of Impossible (or hopeless) Causes due to the miraculous and impossible results of her intercession.