With the presence of Argentine President Javier Milei, Pope Francis canonized this Sunday (11) the first Argentine saint: Blessed María Antonia de Paz y Figueroa, known as Mama Antula.
She was beatified in 2016 in Santiago del Estero, Argentina, after the Pope authorized the publication of a miracle of the recovery of health by nun Vanina Rosa, through the intercession of Mama Antula.
Vanina Rosa had suffered a stroke in 1904 and was part of the Daughters of the Divine Savior Society, whose founder and spiritual mother of the congregation was the first saint in Argentina.
History of the first Argentine saint, Mama Antula
María Antonia de Paz y Figueroa was born in the current province of Santiago del Estero, in 1730. Although she did not belong to a poor family, she took her vows in the Society of Jesus at the age of 15.
“She chose a different path than the traditional one for a woman of her time, who married or became a nun. She wanted to help and serve a forgotten part of society, but not as a nun. In fact, she did not take a vow of obedience, but of chastity and poverty”, highlighted Cíntua Suáres, in a publication on the portal Page 12. She is a biographer of Argentina's first saint, Mama Antula.
Following the precepts of the Jesuits, he helped care for, educate and help the poor and indigenous people of his home province. Therefore, the locals considered her as a protector, receiving the nickname Mama Antula, a name derived from Antonia in the indigenous language Quechua, or Quechua.
The work of now the first saint in Argentina gained even more notoriety after, in February 1767, King Carlos III of Spain issued a decree determining the expulsion of the Jesuits from lands belonging to the Spanish crown. It was when Mama Antula began to travel through northeastern Argentina carrying out spiritual actions, as the Jesuits did.
In 1778 he was in Buenos Aires and tried to spread his teachings, but received opposition from the nobility and the local viceroyalty. Despite this, he ended up founding the Holy House of Spiritual Exercises nearby the city, currently one of the oldest buildings in Buenos Aires, dating from 1794.
Mama Antula died in 1799 and her remains are in the Church of Our Lady of Mercedes in Buenos Aires.
Miracles of Mama Antula
In addition to the healing of Vanina Rosa, which was the first miracle attributed to Mama Antula, the recovery of a man at the beginning of this century, who like Rosa had also suffered a stroke, is credited as the second miracle of the first Argentine saint. According to reports, the man's doctors had come to the conclusion that the clinical situation could not be cured.
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