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Her parents obliged her to go the Ball, but the
choice was already made in her heart. Barnabé, her Franciscan brother,
helped her on her journey of offering herself to God. At eighteen years
of age, she asked her parents to allow her to be a religious, but they
thought this was just an idealism of youth. Clelia knew what she wanted
and the struggle began. She experienced suffering, bitterness, hatred,
despair … every kind of misery of this world. The desire to give
herself, to serve, to live and proclaim the Gospel grew in her.
She came to know the Institute of the Franciscan
Missionaries of Mary through her brother and the missionary horizon
opened out before her.
Her strong personality urged her towards to a firm
decision and, on 24 January 1892, she entered the pre-novitiate; then,
in April she began her novitiate and received the name of Maria Chiara.
Clare" (clear) and such was her life and her offering; a
frank nature, transparent, ardent, Chiara personified missionary joy,
being generous and self-forgetful, often too hasty but always ready to
sacrifice for others.
In China, confronted with the bishop's suggestion to
leave because of the danger, Chiara exclaimed:
"Monsignor,
flee? No. We came to give our lives for God if needs be!"
However, since the orphans, too, were in danger,
Monsignor was preparing two cars to take them away to a Christian
village, and Chiara was to accompany the group. But the gates of the
town were already blocked and they had to come back ... Having
accomplished her duty, she returned happy ...
In the final trial, Chiara was the first, they say,
to receive the mortal blow … Perhaps her height attracted attention
… Was it, perhaps, that she always went forward too quickly towards
what she thought was God's will? …
Her last words were doubtless those she so often
repeated: "Onward
always!" |
