Blessed Saturnina Rodríguez de Zavalía

Saturnina Rodríguez de Zavalía (27 November 1823 – 5 April 1896), also known by her religious name Catalina de María, was an Argentine Roman Catholic professed religious and the founder of the Handmaids of the Heart of Jesus. Zavalía was married for just over a decade before she followed her religious calling and founded an order that spread across Argentina; she collaborated with José Gabriel del Rosario Brochero before her death. The canonization cause started on 1 September 1941 and Pope John Paul II later titled her as Venerable on 18 December 1997. Zavalía was beatified on 25 November 2017 at a Mass celebrated in Córdoba with Cardinal Angelo Amato presiding over it. Saturnina Rodríguez de Zavalía was born in Córdoba on 27 November 1823 as the third of four children to Hilario Rodríguez Orduña (1791–1832) and Catalina Montenegro (1803–26); her baptism was celebrated on 27 November in the town cathedral. Her two elder sisters were Manuela and Petrona and in 1826 her sister Estaurófila was born. Her mother died in 1826 – after the birth of the final child – and her father died in 1832 after having refused to wed again after being widowed. Her paternal aunt Doña Teresa (b. 1766) assumed care for the children after her father died. Her first call to the religious life came in 1840 after she took a course in the Spiritual Exercises alongside the Jesuits. In 1848 she chose the priest Tiburcio López as her spiritual director and it was he who encouraged her to wed. Rodríguez married Manuel Antonio de Zavalía on 13 August 1852 – he was widowed with two children Benito and Deidamia – and he threatened to commit suicide if she refused to wed him; López officiated at this wedding. The couple had one daughter who died either straight after birth or in a miscarriage and it endangered her health. Her marriage was not peaceful at times due to her outburst of anger when she was under pressure which sometimes became violent outbursts.