Gianna Beretta Molla is perhaps one of the most unique Saints to be canonized by Pope John Paul II.  She was a devoted wife, loving mother, a physician - surgeon and pediatrician.  She was a daily communicant since the age of 7, no matter what her studies required or the weather outside.  She led an apostolate called Catholic Action which allowed her a platform for inspiring the laity to grow ever closer to the heart of God and be ever more devoted to the Church.   Gianna and Pietro met at a friend’s first Mass on December 8, 1954.  She was 32 years old and he was 42.  Trained as an engineer, Pietro held the position of technical director for Safa Corporation.  Gianna fascinated Pietro and drew him out of his excessive work. 

The Engagement Period
“Everything has a specific end: everything obeys a law. God has shown each one of us the way, the vocation, and the life of grace that lies beyond physical life. Our earthly and eternal happiness depends on following our vocation without faltering. What is a vocation? It is a gift from God–it comes from God himself. Our concern then, should be to know the will of God. We should enter into the path that God wills for us, not by “forcing the door,” But when God wills as God wills….”  (Gianna’s personal notes found at: http://www.saintgianna.org/ )

Feb. 21, 1955:  “Dearest Pietro, …I want to make you happy and be what you desire: kind, understanding and ready for the sacrifices that life will require.  I haven’t told you yet that I have always been very sensitive and eager for affection…Now you are here whom I love, and I intend to give myself to you, to form a truly Christian family…” 
March 11, 1955: “Dear Pietro…I often ask myself, ‘Will I be worthy of him?’ Yes, worthy of you, Pietro, because I want so much to make you happy, but I fear not being able to do so, and I often feel I am unable to do anything.  When this happens, I ask God, ‘Lord, you see my desire and my good will.  Supply what is lacking and help me to become the wife and mother you desire and which I think Pietro wants, too.’”
Pietro: “From the beginning, and in almost every letter, she returned to this request: ‘Tell me what I should do to make you happy.’  It was not difficult for me to respond to her love.  If her goal was to make me happy, what could I do but strive to make her happy?” 
April 9, 1955:  “My dearest Pietro, How can I thank you for the magnificent ring?  Pietro dear, in exchange, I give you my heart and I will always love you as I love you now.  You are the dearest person to me, and my thoughts, affections, and desires are continually turning toward you on this eve of our engagement.  I can’t wait for the moment when I can be yours forever.  Pietro dearest, you know that I want to see and to know that you are happy; tell me what I should be and what I should do to make you so.  I have great trust in the Lord, and I am certain that He will help me to become your worthy spouse.  I often meditate on the text associated with St. Anne: ‘A strong woman, who will find her?  The heart of her husband can trust in her.  She will do only good things for him and never bring evil upon him throughout all of his life.’  Pietro, I want to be that strong woman for you!  Instead, I feel weak.  This means that I must lean on your strong arm.  I feel so safe, so close to you!  I ask you a favor: from now on, Pietro, if you see me doing something wrong, tell me, okay?  I will always be grateful to you if you do this.”

Pietro:  My dearest Gianna…you are the strong woman I asked of heaven, and our heavenly Mother answered my prayer.  I will always trust my whole heart to you and I will receive everything good from you.  Love me always as you do now; always be affectionate and good, thoughtful and sweet and understanding as you are now.  This is how you are already making me happy and how I ask you to make me happy always.  To me you are the strong woman of the Gospel. 
June 10, 1955:  “Dearest Pietro, I don’t know how to thank you for the beautiful doctor’s office you’re preparing for me with so much love.  When it’s finished and I move in, I will have you even closer to me in my work; in this way, you, too, will alleviate suffering and give joy to my dear patients.  I love you so much, Pietro, and you are always with me, starting in the morning during Holy Mass.  At the Offertory, I offer your work, your joys and your sufferings along with mine; then I repeat the offering all day long until evening.” 
July 1, 1955:  “Think Pietro, about our nest, warmed by our love, and joyful with all the little popi (babies) the Lord will send us!  There will be sorrows, too, of course, but if we always love each other as we do now, then with God’s help, we’ll know how to bear them together.  Don’t you think so?  For now, though, let’s enjoy the happiness of loving each other.  I was always told that the secret of happiness lay in living one moment at a time and in thanking the Lord for everything he sends us.  So, let’s lift up our hearts and be happy!” 
September 4, 1955: “When I think of our great, beautiful love, I can do nothing but thank the Lord.  It’s true that love is the most beautiful gift that God has given to us.  And we’ll always love each other as we do now, Pietro.  In only twenty days, I’ll be…Gianna Molla!  What would you say about our making a tridium to prepare for our marriage?  We could go to Mass on the twenty-first, twenty-second, and twenty-third, you at Ponte Nuovo, I at the shrine of the Assumption.  The Blessed Mother will unite our prayers and, because strength is found in unity, Jesus can’t help but listen to us and answer our prayers.  I’m sure you will say yes, and I thank you.” 
Pietro, September 10, 1955: “Gianna, I want to be the husband of your fondest dreams and your most holy and joyous desires, a husband worthy of your virtues, of your goodness, and of your immense love.” 
September 13, 1955:  “…Dearest Pietro, I’m sure that you will always make me as happy as I am now and that the Lord will listen to your prayers, since they come from a heart that has always love Him and served Him in a saintly way.  Pietro, how much I have to learn from you!  You are such a fine example for me, and I thank you for it.  With God’s help and blessing, we will do all we can to make our new family a little cenacle where Jesus will reign over all our affections, desires, and actions.  My Pietro, our wedding is just a few days away now, and I feel very moved to be so near receiving the sacrament of love.  We will be working with God in His creation; in this way we can give him children who will love and serve Him…”

First Years of Marriage
December 15, 1955:  “…time will pass, and soon it will be Tuesday…and we’ll take up our life again, the beautiful hours of intimacy and affection that I wish would never end…I went to Mass this morning in our little church and I prayed to our beautiful Mother for you, Pietro, that she would help and protect you.”   
November 19, 1956 Gianna and Pietro gave birth to their first son, Pierluigi.
July 16, 1957:  “Pietro dear, it would be too beautiful if we could be together all of the time; everything seems more beautiful when you are with me, and all my worries over Pierluigi decrease with you by my side.  Patience!  Let’s offer it to the Lord so he will help our dear little one bear his first suffering and get perfectly well.  I promised a daily rosary to the Madonna of Guerison for him.  What I wouldn’t do to keep him from suffering!...Let’s hope for the best.”  December 11, 1957 Gianna and Pietro’s second child, Maria Zita is born. 
February 18, 1958:  “…Dear Pietro, I could never have imagined how much I would suffer being a mother!  I always want to see our children beautiful and healthy, without having to suffer, but instead, there is a little thorn in our happiness every day…It’s a good thing you’re more optimistic than I am, so you can encourage me – otherwise, my morale would be almost below zero.” 
Pietro, February 19, 1959:  “I have always rejoiced to find in you the ideal wife of whom I had dreamed, and an incomparable mother to our children; and yet I always discover in you new virtues of sacrifice, patience, understanding, goodness, and so much loving affection.  And here, far from you, your virtues are even more alive and dear to me, and I feel they are very close by.”

Pietro’s Trip to the United States
Pietro, April 27, 1959:  “Before I go to sleep I will tell Jesus, our Heavenly Mother, and our guardian angels:  ‘Bless Gianna, and help me to always know how to make her happy.  Bless the little one we are expecting with so much love and eagerness.  Bless and protect Pierluigi and Mariolina, protect hem from every misfortune and sickness…” 
May 14, 1959:  “…Patience, Pedrin d’or, but I feel better knowing you’re not “in the sky.”  You really are a wonderful Papa.  Who knows what Pierluigi will think one day when he reads your beautiful letters.  Papa prays so much for his little family.  Thank you for the sweet words to their mother.  I will do everything I can to stay this way, as you want me to be, as you see me.” 
Pietro, May 20, 1959:  “…I feel so far away from you, and my love is becoming even stronger; I feel more than ever the duty and the need to thank the good Lord morning and night.” 
May 24, 1959: “My cousin Piera had her baby and they named her Simonetta.  Piera is still in the hospital, though, because they had to do a C-section, I’m not sure why.  But she’s all right and hopes to go home within the week.  What a thought, though…I trust in Our Lady, and I’m sure that she will help me this time, just as she did before.  The prayers of my dearest and most loving Pietro are too many for her not to.  Thank you for everything, Pedrin d’or, for your great love for me and for our treasures, for your fatigue and all your hard work, and for all your sacrifices. 
May 25, 1959: “I got your letter of Thursday the twenty-first this afternoon.  I can’t deny, Pedrin d’or, that when I read you wouldn’t be back until June 10, I got very depressed.  I had a good cry…then I offered this sacrifice to the Lord for you so that he might protect you during all your trips, and for the baby we are expecting, so it will be born beautiful and healthy.  And so, I resigned myself.”
Pietro, May 31, 1959: “Jesus, who created me and who sustains me with unlimited graces and blessings…you, who have given me the immense gift of a wife of gold like that of the most marvelous dawn, which one can only rightly admire from above, and two treasures as splendid as the heavens in all their glory, which can only be embraced on high…you who, in a short time, will repeat your divine gift with another treasure, hear my prayer.  Bless Gianna and our treasures!  Change into grace the anziety and fear of my being so far away and of flying so often.”
June 9, 1959: “My Pietro, do you remember the feast of Ponte Nuovo in 1955?  It was the first time I went to your house – how much we already loved each other!  It’s becaue our love is so great that this separation is such a great sacrifice.  May the Lord accompany you on the flights you still have to take.  Not a day passes when your treasures don’t ask about you…” 
July 15, 1959 Gianna and Pietro give birth to their third child – Laura.

The Last Years
After Pietro’s trip to the United States, he left home less often and so we have fewer letters from that period of time.  She endured two miscarriages before conceiving in July of 1961.   By September the doctors had found a fibroma which had developed on the wall of her uterus.  She was given three options:  an abortion, saving her life but losing the life of her child; a complete hysterectomy, which would save her life but prevent future pregnancies; or they could remove the fibroma which was dangerous for the child and could be fatal for Gianna.  Trusting in Providence, Gianna opted for the removal of the fibroma only.  As a medical doctor and surgeon, fully understanding the consequences of her decision, she instructed the doctors:  “If you must decided between me and the child, do not hesitate: choose the child - I insist on it. Save him”.

On April 21, 1962, Gianna Emanuela was born.  Despite all efforts and treatments to save both of them, on the morning of April 28, amid unspeakable pain and after repeated exclamations of “Jesus, I love you. Jesus, I love you”, Gianna died. She was 39 years old.
Pietro:  “I remember when you told me, on Wednesday morning, with such solemnity, that it almost seemed otherworldly: ‘Pietro, I am cured now.  Pietro, I was already on the other side, and if you only knew what I saw.  Someday I’ll tell you.  But since we were too happy, too comfortable with our marvelous children, full of health and grace and all of heaven’s blessings they sent me back to suffer some more, because it is not right to present ourselves before the Lord without having suffered much.’  This was and remains for me your testament of joy and suffering.”  (Guerriero, Elio. Love Letters to My Husband.  2002, Daughters of St. Paul)
“Conscious immolation”, was the phrase used by Pope Paul VI to define the act of Blessed Gianna, remembering her at the Sunday Angelus of September 23, 1973, as: ‘A young mother from the diocese of Milan, who, to give life to her daughter, sacrificed her own, with conscious immolation’. The Holy Father in these words clearly refers to Christ on Calvary and in the Eucharist.  Gianna was beatified by Pope John Paul II on April 24, 1994, during the international Year of the Family.”
(Vatican website: http://www.vatican.va/news_services/liturgy/saints/ns_lit_doc_20040516_beretta-molla_en.html)  She was canonized a Saint by Pope John Paul II on May 16, 2004. 
Gianna Beretta Molla described her vocation to marriage saying: “There are many difficulties, but with the help of God we can go forward fearlessly, and if we should have to die struggling for our vocation, it would be the most beautiful day of our life.” 

For More Information on Saint Gianna Beretta Molla:
Beretta Molla, Gianna.  Love Letters to My Husband.  Elio Guerriero.  Boston: Daughters of St. Paul, 2002. 
Pelucchi, Giuliana. Blessed Gianna Beretta Molla: A Woman's Life, 1922-1962. Pauline Books and Media, 2002.
Pietro Molla, et al. Saint Gianna Molla: Wife, Mother, Doctor.  Ignatius Press, 2004.
The Society of Saint Gianna Beretta Molla:  http://www.saintgianna.org
Gianna Beretta Molla (1922-1962), Vatican web site: http://www.vatican.va/news_services/liturgy/saints/ns_lit_doc_20040516_beretta-molla_en.html