Maria Grazia Tarallo

Maria Grazia Tarallo was born on 23 September 1866 in Barra, a locality of Naples, in the recently unified Kingdom of Italy. She was the second of seven children of Leopoldo Tarallo and Concetta Borriello and was baptized shortly after birth. From childhood she showed a strong inclination to prayer and a desire for consecrated life. She received First Communion and Confirmation in 1878. Her father wished her to marry, and a suitor was put forward, but she refused marriage in order to follow a religious vocation, remaining under spiritual direction while she waited for the opportunity to enter a convent.

On 1 June 1891 she entered the Congregation of the Sisters Crucified Adorers of the Eucharist at San Giorgio a Cremano, near Naples, a community founded in the late nineteenth century with a charism of Eucharistic adoration and union with the Crucified Christ. She took the religious name Sister Maria of the Passion of Our Lord Jesus Christ. In the convent she was remembered for humility, obedience, charity toward her sisters, and an intense devotion to the Eucharist and to the Passion. She served in ordinary community duties and as mistress of novices, forming younger members of the institute according to the congregation’s spirit.

Accounts of her religious life describe both hidden fidelity and reported mystical graces, together with prolonged physical suffering and illness which she offered in union with Christ’s Passion. She remained in the same Neapolitan community until her death on 27 July 1912 at San Giorgio a Cremano, at the age of forty-five. A reputation for holiness persisted after her death among the sisters and the local faithful, and her remains have been kept for veneration at the congregation’s house in San Giorgio a Cremano.

The diocesan inquiry into her life and virtues was followed by the Roman phase of the cause. Pope Benedict XVI recognized her heroic virtues and declared her Venerable on 19 December 2005. After acceptance of a miracle attributed to her intercession, she was beatified on 14 May 2006 in Naples; Cardinal José Saraiva Martins, prefect of the Congregation for the Causes of Saints, presided in the pope’s name. She has not been canonized. Her liturgical memorial is kept on 27 July, the anniversary of her death. She is known in the Church as Blessed Maria of the Passion of Our Lord Jesus Christ.