At Barcelona in Spain, Blessed Petra of Saint Joseph (Anna Josepha) Pérez Florido, virgin, who eagerly devoted constant care to the abandoned elderly and founded the Congregation of the Sisters of the Mothers of the Abandoned.
Lifespan: 1845–1906
Beatified: 16 October 1994 by Pope John Paul II
Memoria liturgica: 16 August
Whoever wishes to be first among you will be the servant of all.
Mark 10:44
Ana Josefa Pérez Florido was born on 7 December 1845 in the valley of Abdalajís (Málaga, Spain), the last of the nineteen children of José Pérez and María Florido.
Petra of Saint Joseph is an example of a consecrated woman who, amid countless difficulties, received with faith the charism that the Holy Spirit accorded her in the service of all.
Orphaned from a very young age, she took the Virgin as her mother. This experience marked her entire life, as she discovered that her vocation was to be a mother to children, young people, and the elderly who lacked family affection and love.
Mother Petra is indeed an example of how the virginity of men and women religious is transformed into a fruitful spiritual motherhood, undertaken and brought to fulfilment through spousal love for Jesus Christ, and expressed in a total and open availability to those in need. Feeling herself loved by God and responding to that love — even amid a thousand trials — she offers us a luminous model of prayer, of sacrifice for her brethren, and of service to the poor: manifestations of religious life upon which the Synod Fathers were then reflecting.
Her profound devotion and her unbounded trust in Saint Joseph marked her entire life and her work, and she has been called the “apostle of Saint Joseph of the nineteenth century.” In the final period of her earthly life, the names of Jesus, Mary, and Joseph rose constantly to her lips: the Holy Family of Nazareth, in whose school of love, prayer, and mercy her spirituality had grown, as she guided her Daughters along this path of holiness.