Saint Rita applied for entrance in the convent of the Augustinians in
Cascia, after the murder of her husband. Her admittance was denied
because the rule of the order barred the acceptance of widows. Her
prayers were answered when her patron saints, Augustine, Nicholas of
Tolentino, and John the Baptist appeared to her at night and
accompanied her to the Augustinian convent, Santa Maria Magdalena;
bolted gates and locked doors miraculously opened to permit her
entrance into the chapel, where the astonished sisters discovered her
the next morning. Seeing in her unusual entry the holy will of God,
Rita was at last admitted into the convent, which was to be renamed in
her honor during subsequent ages.
Inspired by a sermon preached by St. James of the Marches, she
implored God for some participation in Christ’s sufferings and was
divinely accorded a thorn wound in her forehead, which festered and
produced such an offensive odor that the next fifteen years of her life
were spent in reverential seclusion…At the time of her entrance into
Heaven, the cell wherein she lay was filled with an extraordinary
perfume; an astounding light emanated from the wound on her
forehead; and the bells of the city are said to have been joyously pealed
by angels.
The numerous miracles which occurred after her death and her
sweetly perfumed body, which scented the entire church where she lay
exposed, induced the civil and ecclesiastical authorities to install her
remains in a place accessible to the pilgrims who constantly visited the
bier. It was subsequently placed in the inner oratory where it was
enshrined beneath an altar. In this position between the cloister and the
church, the wooden sarcophagus could easily be seen and its precious
contents venerated by both the pilgrims and the cloistered nuns.
St. Rita has taken her rightful position among the great saints who
served in turn as wives, mothers, widows, and nuns, providentially
given to us for our edification. She is still overwhelmingly and
affectionately regarded by her many satisfied devotees around the
world as the “Guardian Saint of Desperate & Impossible Cases.”
The Incorruptibles, From pgs. 130-133