Serving the Poor and Marginalized Was St. Giovanni Calabria's Charism

by Unknown

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St Giovanni Calabria was born on 8 October 1873 in Verona, Italy. He was the seventh child of a cobbler and a maid. Poverty was his companion from birth. After his father's death, he had to interrupt his fourth year of elementary school to find a job. The rector of San Lorenzo, Fr Pietro Scapini, noticing the virtues of this boy, prepared him privately for the admission examination into the seminary. Having passed his exams, he was admitted to the school but his studies were interrupted by two years of military service.

Having terminated his military service, he resumed his studies. One very cold night in 1897, as he was returning home from a visit to the sick, he found a boy crouching on the doorstep of his house; he had run away from the Gypsies. Fr Calabria picked him up, took him in, kept him in his house and shared his room with him. It was the beginning of his work for orphaned and abandoned boys.

A few months later he founded the "Pious Union for Assistance to the Sick". These were only the beginnings of a life marked by charity. "Every instant of his life was a personification of St Paul's marvellous hymn on charity", wrote a Jewish woman doctor in her Lettera Postulatoria to Paul VI about Fr Calabria. She had been in hiding from Nazi-Fascist persecution in one of his religious institutes.

After being ordained a priest on 11 August 1901, he was appointed confessor of the seminary and curate of St Stephen's Church. He devoted himself to hearing confessions and to charitable works, helping the poor and marginalized.

In 1907 he was appointed vicar of St Benedict "al Monte". On 26 November 1907 he founded the "Casa Buoni Fanciulli". The following year it moved definitively to Via San Zeno in Monte, today their motherhouse.

The Lord also sent him lay people wishing to offer their lives to the Lord. With this handful of men totally given to God in the service of the poor, he revived the apostolic spirit of the Church in Verona. This nucleus of men was the foundation of the Congregation of the Poor Servants of Divine Providence, approved by the Bishop of Verona on 11 February 1932 and receiving pontifical approval on 25 April 1949.

Immediately after the diocesan approval, the Congregation spread to various parts of Italy — serving the poor, the abandoned and the marginalized. It also extended its works to the elderly and to the sick. In 1910 he founded the female branch, which later became a congregation of diocesan right on 25 March 1952 with the name of Poor Sister Servants of Divine Providence; on 25 December 1981 it obtained pontifical approval.

He became a prophetic voice. Bishops, priests, religious and the laity found in him a sure guide for themselves and their projects. He understood that even the laity could be involved in this radical spiritual renewal and in 1944 founded the "Family of Ex-tern Brothers", made up solely of laymen.

On the eve of his death he made his last act of charity, offering his life to God for the dying Pope Pius XII. The Lord accepted this offer, for while he was dying, the Pope mysteriously and unexpectedly recovered and lived for another four years. Fr Calabria died on 4 December 1954.

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