Painting by Neilson Carlin at Our Lady of Guadalupe Shrine

St. Gianna Molla, mother and physician, is called “the martyr of maternal love.” If you’re not familiar with St. Gianna’s life, read St. Gianna’s story here or here. Quick facts:

Born: 4 October 1922
Died: 28 April 1962
Canonized: 16 May 2004 by Pope John Paul II
Feast Day: April 28
Patron Saint of: mothers, physicians

Imagine the extraordinary occasion of attending the canonization to sainthood of your own spouse. Many people love and admire their husband or wife dearly, and many even have attained great virtue. Even of the holiest of laypeople, could you imagine attending a Mass declaring the heroic virtue and miraculous intercession of your deceased beloved surrounded by multitudes and lead by the Vicar of Christ?

On May 16, 2004 Pietro Molla, husband of Gianna Beretta Molla, did just that, with his three living children in attendance, including the youngest, Gianna Emmanuella, for whom her mother died.

St. Gianna is the first laywoman and doctor to be canonized, and is truly a saint for modern times. Pope John Paul II said in his homily on the day of her canonization,

Following the example of Christ, who “having loved his own… loved them to the end” (Jn 13: 1), this holy mother of a family remained heroically faithful to the commitment she made on the day of her marriage. The extreme sacrifice she sealed with her life testifies that only those who have the courage to give of themselves totally to God and to others are able to fulfil themselves. Through the example of Gianna Beretta Molla, may our age rediscover the pure, chaste and fruitful beauty of conjugal love, lived as a response to the divine call! “

But before St. Gianna decided God was calling her to the vocation of Holy Matrimony, though, she discerned very carefully, and even considered a consecrated vocation. She meditated, spent time in silent prayer, and patiently waited for the Lord to reveal His will. We should all do the same thing, waiting for the Lord in His own time, never forcing his hand, and obeying with great swiftness and generosity once we do understand His will.

Helen Hull Hitchcock, director of Women for Faith & Family, explains very eloquently St. Gianna’s beautiful balance between her vocational life as wife and mother, and her professional life as physician,

“In canonizing Gianna Beretta Molla this spring (2004), the Church officially recognized the extraordinary sanctity of a woman who chose to live an ordinary life – as a professional and, later, as a wife and mother.  Though she had once considered entering a religious order, instead she practiced medicine (receiving her medical degree in 1949, and her specialty in pediatrics in 1952). She devoted herself to caring for her patients, and her selflessness and dedication as a physician endeared her to the people.  But it was not only her practice of medicine that influenced them. She regarded her profession as a mission through which she could aid and nurture both bodies and souls. The young doctor’s devotion to her Catholic faith was well known in her community, and especially her instruction of young Catholic girls in their faith.”

So today, give thanks for the life and death of St. Gianna Beretta Molla, and pray for the unity of families and the holiness and conversion of physicians, that they may serve unselfishly, choose life and stop prescribing contraception.

Ways to celebrate St. Gianna’s feast day (honestly, it’s tough because it’s also the feast day of two other great saints, St. Peter Chanel & St. Louis Mary de Montfort):

• Thank a mother for their heroic and ordinary sacrifices.
• Thank a medical professional that doesn’t prescribe contraception or perform/ cooperate in sterilizations
• Read a book on the life of St. Gianna–St. Gianna Molla: Wife, Mother & Doctor by Pietro Molla, Elio Guerriero, James G. Colbert (Ignatius Press)
• Pray for a physician or pharmacist you know who still prescribes contraception, and give them Patty Schneier’s “Prove It, God! CD” or the book, “Physicians Healed.”
• Make a donation to the Catholic Medical Association.
• Order St. Gianna Holy Cards, and include them in your Mother’s Day cards.
• Check out St. Gianna on Facebook, or see one of her Facebook Groups here.

A friend sent me the link to this up-and-coming documentary. I’ve not seen it yet, so I can’t give a commentary or full analysis, but I support natural childbirth. I *think* I understand where they’re going with the “orgasmic” parlance, but I’d like to see it before I make a judgement. The friend who sent the announcement to me is super excited, and hoping it really displays the sacred of human birth and life.
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Vlm9y6hQpk]

See Orgasmic Birth for more information.

It’ll be showing at the Majestic in Madison, WI Sunday March 8, 2pm. See the official web site for other shows.

I nixed the Teens and Birth Control show on the FertilityCare iPod queue because it was more moral and cultural commentary than about diagnosing young women’s menstrual issues. It was a good show, and a little insightful into the average teen-and-mother/ doctor experience; i.e., what the doctor says when prescribing versus what he really things, and the general lack of knowledge into women’s wellness. What it comes down to is that typical Ob/Gyns are not prepared to identify, diagnose and treat girls’ or womens’ wellness issues without the Pill. There’s a lot of reasons for this–lack of education, contraceptive bias, pharma kickbacks for prescribing the Pill, etc.–but in the end, the Pill serves as a band aid over the underlying issue, which may persist for years and cause problems down the line. However, I was looking for more of the medical/ fertility commentary on that issue.

Which brings me to the next episode I’d like to feature: Women Healed: Infertility. In this episode Dr. Hilgers talks about FertilityCare vs. IVF, and why FertilityCare blows IVF out of the water, not only for helping people conceive, but also for treating their fertility issues. His years of research and medical practice developed into something called NaProTechnology, or Natural Procreative Technology. It’s a major breakthrough for reproductive science, offering real solutions to some real issues:

• Infertility
• Menstrual Cramps
• Premenstrual Syndrome (PMS)
• Ovarian Cysts
• Irregular or abnormal bleeding
• Polycystic ovarian disease
• Repetitive miscarriage
• Postpartum depression
• Prematurity prevention
• Hormonal abnormalities

…and so on.

It’s really quite astounding once one looks into NaProTechnology, which is a fertility-based women’s care, not fertility-control, or fertility-suppression methods. It works with your whole body because fertility is a state of wellness, not a disease to treat. Dr. Hilgers has put together a book of the same title of this post, which you can find here. Are you ready to find out more about being healed?

This is a surprisingly quasi-balanced article from the New York Times on larger families and the struggles of prejudice they face. The author, Kate Zernike, like any good writer, hits pros and cons, works in the controversial buzz stories, like unwed and unemployed Nadya Suleman, the new octuplet mother (I’m not even going to begin my critique here), or British environazi Jonathon Porritt‘s orwelian declaration that there should be a two-child limit imposed on families to save the environment, and anything contrary would be “irresponsible.” Don’t forget the mandatory Angelina Jolie brood mention.

She talks about how larger families don’t seem to be inherently immoral as Porritt suggest, but states, “If large families are the stuff of spectacle, it is partly because they have become rarer.”

I really like that Zernike delves into this topic with a sympathetic ear and a balanced pen, but the question she doesn’t ask–or at least doesn’t publish–in depth is why large families are rarer. Sure, she mentions the dawn of contraception and its widespread use, but she doesn’t get to the burning question at hand: why do large families forgo contraception, and what are the results, and the differences between them and the “average” family? A great follow up to this article would be a piece on the contra-contraception movement, which is made up of a diversity of advocates, large families and small.

Zernike does go the extra mile to show that these families are regular, intelligent people, and I like that.  She also shows their sense of humor in the face of intrusive and rude comments about their family size, relaying any number of sassy replies.

Among her interviewees is Leslie Fields, author of “The Case for Kids,” whose brave and forthright testimony in Christianity Today drew all sorts of angry letters. (Thank you Lambeth ’30 for planting those seeds.) Fields rightly notes that you can’t even enter into debate with people who are that angry and irrational (as we found out from the childfree comment-and-crucify session we had last year and the year before).

Some of my favorite quotes:
“How can you afford so many? ‘Lifestyles are expensive, not kids.’ ”

“‘Children are a kind of wealth,’ Mrs. Curtis said. ‘Just not the kind of wealth our society tends to focus on.’”

Thought these were cute…