At Poggio a Caiano in Tuscany, Blessed Mary Margaret (Mary Anne Rose) Caiani, virgin, who founded the Franciscan Institute of the Minim Sisters of the Sacred Heart, for the education of the young and the care of the sick.
Lifespan: 1863–1921
Beatified: 23 April 1989 by Pope John Paul II
Memoria liturgica: 8 August
I give you a new commandment: love one another as I have loved you.
John 13:34
Maria Anna Caiani was born at Poggio a Caiano, near Prato, on 2 November 1863. Called to consecrated life, she entered in her youth the Congregation of the Suore Bettine of San Massimo at Campi Bisenzio, but after a time she did not feel fulfilled there and withdrew, intending to found a congregation of her own. While waiting, she devoted herself to working among the children of the poor, opening a school.
Several women drawn to community life began to gather around her, and the Bishop of Pistoia authorized the first rule of the small community and the use of a religious habit. On 15 December 1902 she received the religious habit together with the first five sisters, taking the name Mary Margaret. The Institute of the Minims of the Sacred Heart of Jesus of the Third Order of Saint Francis thus came into being. Fraternal life and prayer are the cornerstones of this new religious family.
Sister Mary Margaret died in Florence on 8 August 1921. The Congregation, approved by the Holy See in 1926, today numbers 54 houses and more than 500 sisters.