Blessed Juana María Condesa Lluch

Juana María Condesa Lluch (30 March 1862 – 16 January 1916) was a Spanish religious sister who established the Handmaids of Mary Immaculate in her hometown of Valencia. She made her vows in 1911. Lluch dedicated her life to the promotion of the rights of workers ever since her childhood when she first witnessed the terrible conditions of laborers. Her initiatives in Spain were aimed towards the workers and their families as a means of alleviating their burdens and championing their fundamental rights as individuals. Lluch provided material and spiritual support to workers across Valencia. Pope John Paul II presided over her beatification in Saint Peter's Square on 23 March 2003. Juana María Condesa Lluch was born in Valencia on 30 March 1862 as the fourth child to Doctor Lluís Condesa and Joana Lluch; both were Third Order Carmelites. She received baptism on 31 March 1862 in the church of Saint Stephen. She later received her Confirmation in the same church in 1864. Lluch received a good education during her childhood due to her life of wealth and her upbringing. She started her devotion to the Holy Eucharist, the Blessed Virgin Mary and Saint Joseph. She felt called to the religious life at the age of eighteen and saw the need to aid the workers who worked in de-humanizing conditions. She saw these conditions firsthand while in her coach passing workers. Around this time her spiritual director was Vicente Castañer. Cardinal Antoín Monescillo – the Archbishop of Valencia – refused her request to establish a religious congregation and said that Lluch was not old enough to contemplate establishing a congregation. In 1884 she received approval to open a shelter to provide spiritual and material assistance to workers and their families. She also opened a school for their children around the same time on 25 March 1884; she founded a congregation in 1884 around that same period.