Everything is ready in Montepiselli for the feast of Saint Teresa of the Child Jesus and the Holy Face, which will culminate next Sunday at 5.30pm with the blessing of the roses and the procession of the simulacrum through the streets surrounding the parish church, the only one in the city dedicated to the saint of Liseux. A moment awaited by the community which in recent years has been committed to spreading the cult of the Carmelite nun who died young, known and venerated as a saint of suffering and missions and an icon of universal compassion. In this special year, which marks the 150th anniversary of her birth (1873-2023) and the centenary of her beatification (1923-2023), the parish priest Don Giovanni Sturiale has promoted a renewed cultural and spiritual journey inaugurated a few weeks ago with the presentation of the volume “Più forte dell’steel.
Letters from the trenches to Therese of Lisieux”, which collects 75 of the over two thousand epistles preserved in the Carmel of Lisieux, written by soldiers, corporals, stretcher bearers, artillerymen, infantrymen and sergeants to express gratitude to the “little saint” (not yet canonised at the time) for the protection, healing and liberation from the horrors of war received. Tomorrow and Saturday the last two days of the novena with the rosary at 5.30pm and mass at 6pm, animated by the parish community of S. Maria delle Grazie of the Gravidelle district with the confraternity of the Divine Mercy of Montalto and the Amici di Suor Maria association Alfonsa of the Child Jesus with the assistant Brother Tonino Bono who at the end of the celebration will lead the Eucharistic adoration with the prayer of liberation and healing. Sunday 1 October, solemnity of Saint Teresa, at 9 am the first mass presided over by the Franciscan Brother Benedetto Amodeo; at 11 the solemn celebration presided over by the parish priest Don Sturiale and at 12 the supplication to the Madonna of Pompeii. At the end of the masses there will be a blessing of the roses. Among the cultural recreational initiatives, the dessert fair will be set up in the parish hall on Saturday and Sunday before and after the celebrations.