Luigi Guanella was born on 19 December 1842 at Fraciscio, a hamlet of Campodolcino in the Diocese of Como, the ninth of thirteen children of Lorenzo Guanella and Maria Bianchi. The day after his birth he received Baptism. His parents were exemplary Christians, devoted to family, farm work, and shepherding. In the home the Rosary was recited and the lives of the saints were read—an experience that marked his whole apostolic life.
At twelve he entered the seminary. On 26 May 1866 he was ordained a priest in Como and the following year was named parish priest of Savogno. During seven years of zealous ministry he came into contact with Don Bosco and with the Cottolengo work in Turin. Longing for a more radical religious life, in 1875 he went to Don Bosco and pronounced religious vows for a three-year period. The Bishop of Como recalled him to the diocese; Don Guanella returned with the dream of founding an institution for needy boys. He opened a school that later had to close because of hostility from the civil authorities.
What he called "the hour of mercy"—the favorable moment of divine favor—struck in November 1881, when he arrived as parish priest at Pianello Lario and found a group of young women already dedicated to assisting the needy. That group became the seed of a new congregation: the Daughters of Saint Mary of Providence. His apostolic zeal and charity enlarged the work until it could expand into the heart of the city of Como. There began the activity of the "House of Divine Providence," which became the mother house of both the women's and the men's congregations. Beside the sisters, Don Guanella gathered priests whom he called the Servants of Charity. Their motto was "In omnibus caritas"—in all things love.
"One cannot stop as long as there are poor people to help," he often repeated on his pilgrimages among the wounds of poverty. For that reason the two religious families spread through various regions of Italy and into the nearby Swiss Confederation, in the Cantons of Grisons and Ticino. In 1904 he realized the dream of reaching the holy city, Rome, to stand beside the Pope and give luminous witness of charity and apostolic ardor. Saint Pius X, who recognized the greatness of Don Guanella's heart, esteemed him and entrusted him with the desire to build a church dedicated to the Transit of Saint Joseph. Beside the parish arose the Pious Union of the Transit of Saint Joseph, an association of prayers for the dying; Saint Pius X wished to be its first enrollee. Missionary zeal then drew him among Italian emigrants in North America: in December 1912, at the age of seventy, he embarked and reached the United States.
His last extraordinary intervention came in January 1915, when he remained in Rome to aid the earthquake victims of Abruzzo. At his side worked with zeal the Venerable Aurelio Bacciarini, first parish priest of Saint Joseph, his successor in governing the Servants of Charity, and later Bishop of Lugano. The infirmities of old age, Italy's entry into the First World War, and the commitment of some confreres at the military front undermined his health. In his writings he had left this message: death is like a mother who embraces her child; it is the angel who leads us back to the homeland. That mother, shining like an angel, came at 2:15 in the afternoon on Sunday, 24 October 1915. It was a Sunday without sunset. His remains rest in the Sanctuary of the Sacred Heart in Como. He was beatified by Pope Paul VI on 25 October 1964 and canonized by Pope Benedict XVI on 23 October 2011.
May Saint Luigi Guanella intercede for us, and let us practice today his tireless charity toward the poorest.
