Venerable Serafina of God

Serafina of God, OCarm, (Italian: Serafina di Dio), also known as Seraphine of Capri, (24 October 1621 – 17 March 1699) an Italian Carmelite who was the founder of seven Carmelite convents of the ancient observance in Southern Italy. The cause for her beatification has been formally accepted by the Holy See, which has declared her to have lived a life of heroic virtue. Serafina was born as Prudentia Pisa in Naples, then capital of the Kingdom of Naples, on 24 October 1621 into a wealthy merchant family which moved to the island of Capri when she was still a child. She developed a great love of the Lives of the Christian martyrs. As a teenager she refused a marriage proposed by her father and was expelled from the family home for a period of several years, having to live in the equivalent of a chicken coop in the back yard, and her mother would sneak food to her when the father wasn't taking notice. From the age of 15, she would visit and minister to the sick and this ministry would continue notably during the Neapolitan plague of 1656 which took her own mother's life. After the death of an uncle who had been a priest from this same plague, Prudentia continued her plans for a contemplative convent on the island of Capri, for which she recruited several women from Naples. On 29 May 1661, in the Naples Cathedral, she and her companions made the vows in the Carmelite order, and Prudentia assumed the religious name Serafina of God. On the following 2 October the women took up residence in the house Pisa's uncle had left her. When that house grew too small for the developing community, a new and elaborate monastery dedicated to the Most Holy Saviour was consecrated in 1675. Mother Serafina was to eventually found seven monasteries in the Naples area and several elsewhere in Italy. In her prayer life and mysticism, Pisa was often compared to Teresa of Avila, to whom she had a strong devotion, in the deep mystical graces she experienced.