At Zaragoza in Spain, Saint Genoveva Torres Morales, virgin, who from childhood experienced the hardships of life and was afflicted with poor health, yet founded the Institute of the Sisters of the Sacred Heart of Jesus and of the Holy Angels, that they might be of help to women.
Lifespan: 1870–1956
Beatified: 29 January 1995 by Pope John Paul II
Canonized: 4 May 2003 by Pope John Paul II, Madrid, Spain
Memoria liturgica: 5 January
“The apostle of Madrid” was an instrument of God’s tenderness toward the lonely and those in need of love.
Genoveva Torres Morales was born in Almenara (Castellón) on 3 January 1870. Orphaned at the age of eight, she found herself responsible for the household and the care of a brother. At the age of thirteen, she underwent the amputation of a leg; the surgery, performed in rudimentary conditions, left her obliged to walk on crutches for the rest of her life. She was admitted to the House of Mercy in Valencia, where she was able to complete her deficient formal education and to deepen her spiritual life. At the age of twenty-four, together with two companions, she founded the Angelic Society to offer protection to lonely women and to foster nocturnal adoration of the Eucharist. From the Mother House in Saragossa, the work spread rapidly.
Of an affable and merciful character, she guided with spiritual wisdom the work she had founded, which, with pontifical approval, was named the Congregation of the Sisters of the Sacred Heart of Jesus and the Holy Angels. Profoundly devoted to the Virgin, especially through the prayer of the Rosary, the centre of her life was the Heart of Jesus and the Eucharist. She died in Saragossa on 5 January 1956. The faithful began to invoke her under the title of “Angel of Solitude.”
She was beatified by John Paul II on 29 January 1995.