Sandra Sabattini was a 22 year old girl, devoted to Jesus in the Eucharist, who belonged to a religious group that cared for the sick and drug addicts. She was hit by a car and died while on the way to a meeting. Blessed Sandra Sabattini (born 19 August 1961 – died 2 May 1984) was an Italian Roman Catholic and a member of the Association Community Pope John XXIII. Sunday, October 24, World Mission Sunday, Sandra Sabattini, was beatified in Rimini. (her biography is below)
Here is the miracle attributed to her intercession:
Stefano Vitali was diagnosed with a malignant tumor. On July 26, 2007 Stefano was operated on. The surgeon notes that this is advanced stage fourth cancer. The material examined after surgery showed "massive metastases to all 37 lymph nodes". Dr. Ravaioli, head of Oncology and friend of Stefano, after leaving the operating room goes to Vitali's wife: «There is nothing to do, he only has a few months left. Don't let him go around hospitals ». Stefano Vitali, 40, married to Lolli, four natural children, three in foster care "regenerated in love", municipal councilor, should have died within a few months. Fr. Benzi first listens to Stefano for a long time. Then, resolutely, he says to him: "I asked the whole community to pray to Sandra Sabattini to intercede for your recovery." The healing Stefano says: On November 5, 2007, after only five cycles of chemotherapy, the tumor was in remission. The CT scans of the following days confirm the disappearance of all tumors. Stefano was healed.
In 2019 the Congregation for the Causes of Saints convenes a medical commission composed of specialists, both believers and non-believers, to judge the exceptional recovery of Stefano Vitali. The Commission considers Stefano Vitali's very rapid, complete and lasting recovery to be "scientifically inexplicable". On 2 October 2019 Pope Francis authorizes the Congregation for the Causes of Saints to promulgate the Decree concerning the miracle, attributed to the intercession of Sandra Sabattini, who will therefore be proclaimed Blessed.
Biography of Sandra:
On April 29, 1984 Sandra was going to a meeting of the Pope John XXIII Community. With her are Guido, her boyfriend, and Elio. As soon as they get out of the car, Sandra and Elio are hit by a car. Sandra is hit in full, catapulted onto the hood and thrown to the ground. Fr. Benzi rushes into the ambulance and holds her mouth open so that she would not be suffocated. From Rimini she was immediately moved to the “Bellaria” hospital in Bologna. She remains in a coma for three days and on May 2 he leaves this earth. She was 22 years old.
The funeral was held on May 5th. In his homily Fr. Oreste said: «Sandra has done what God had sent her for. The world is not divided into good and bad, but into those who love and those who do not love. And Sandra, we know, loved a lot ». Her mother Agnes understood that day: « Fr., we had a saint in the house and we didn't realize it! Take the book and pray as Sandra did ».
Four days before the accident, Sandra had told her mother that she had seen a funeral and a grave full of flowers in a dream. On the last page of her diary, two days before the accident, Sandra left her spiritual testament:
“This life is not mine that is evolving rhythmically by a regular breath that is not mine, enlivened by a peaceful day that is not mine. There is nothing in this world that is yours.
Sandra, realize it!
It is all a gift on which the "Giver" can intervene when and how he wants. Take care of the gift given to you, make it more beautiful and full for when the time comes ".
(27.04.1984)
Childhood
Sandra Sabattini was born on August 19, 1961 in Riccione and was baptized the following day. His deeply Christian family lives in Misano Adriatico. At the age of four, the family moved to Rimini to live in the rectory of the parish of San Girolamo, where the uncle, Don Giuseppe Bonini, brother of his mother, is parish priest. This circumstance allowed little Sandra to participate assiduously in prayer, cultivating a personal bond with the Lord.
It was around 1973 that she first met the Servant of God Oreste Benzi at one of the several meetings of Fr. Benzi's Associazione Community Pope John XXIII that her uncle organized in his parish. In summer 1974 she took part in a summer program for teenagers at the Madonna of the Vette house in Canazei (Trento) for the disabled. This experience left her with a profound spiritual joy.
The funeral was held on May 5th. In his homily Fr. Oreste said: «Sandra has done what God had sent her for. The world is not divided into good and bad, but into those who love and those who do not love. And Sandra, we know, loved a lot ». Her mother Agnes understood that day: « Fr., we had a saint in the house and we didn't realize it! Take the book and pray as Sandra did ».
Four days before the accident, Sandra had told her mother that she had seen a funeral and a grave full of flowers in a dream. On the last page of her diary, two days before the accident, Sandra left her spiritual testament:
“This life is not mine that is evolving rhythmically by a regular breath that is not mine, enlivened by a peaceful day that is not mine. There is nothing in this world that is yours.
Sandra, realize it!
It is all a gift on which the "Giver" can intervene when and how he wants. Take care of the gift given to you, make it more beautiful and full for when the time comes ".
(27.04.1984)
Childhood
Sandra Sabattini was born on August 19, 1961 in Riccione and was baptized the following day. His deeply Christian family lives in Misano Adriatico. At the age of four, the family moved to Rimini to live in the rectory of the parish of San Girolamo, where the uncle, Don Giuseppe Bonini, brother of his mother, is parish priest. This circumstance allowed little Sandra to participate assiduously in prayer, cultivating a personal bond with the Lord.
It was around 1973 that she first met the Servant of God Oreste Benzi at one of the several meetings of Fr. Benzi's Associazione Community Pope John XXIII that her uncle organized in his parish. In summer 1974 she took part in a summer program for teenagers at the Madonna of the Vette house in Canazei (Trento) for the disabled. This experience left her with a profound spiritual joy.
The grandmother says that in the evening she found her granddaughter asleep in bed with the rosary in her hands. During a camp, at the age of 7, an counsellor remembers: «I often observed her when she entered the chapel alone, with the doll in one hand and the rosary in the other. She knelt in the last pew and bowed her little head. He stayed a while, then he went out and happily followed the group ». On another occasion, when she was still an elementary school child, they found her at one in the morning absorbed in contemplation before the tabernacle.
« She got up early, early in the morning, to find herself alone in meditation, perhaps in the dark, in front of the Blessed Sacrament, before others arrived at the church. - reports his uncle Don Giuseppe - On the first day of the year, from one to two in the morning, he stood before Jesus in adoration. She loved to pray sitting on the ground, as a sign of humility and poverty ».
"Thank you, Lord, because I have received beautiful things from life so far, I have everything, but above all I thank you because you have revealed yourself to me, because I have known you"
(5/12/1977)
Sandra does well in school, loves to paint, learns to play the piano and runs as a sprinter in an athletics team.
At 12, a fundamental meeting. The one with Fr. Oreste Benzi and the Pope John XXIII Community, a community whose vocation consists in " conforming one's life to Jesus and directly sharing the life of the least, placing one's life with theirs and taking charge of their situation ". Here Sandra fulfills her Christian vocation and, deeply united to the Lord, she does her utmost to transmit divine love to the poor, the abandoned and drug addicts.
She enrolled in the Faculty of Medicine at the University of Bologna in 1980. She divided time between study, family, work and sharing with the poor. Despite the large amount of work he never neglects her studies: at each exam he scores excellent marks.
The engagement
In February 1978 she met Guido, to whom she got engaged the following year, when Sandra turned 18. Guido, older than two years, is attracted by her depth, her sympathy and her willingness to refer to God for every choice. Together they frequent the youth group of Fr. Benzi's community. The engagement is not experienced as an arrangement, an end, a closure, but as a broader horizon to open up to the space of God's infinite love. Sandra experiences her being engaged as a realization of God's plan that does not compromise her own. dedication to the Lord and neighbor.
“Engagement: something integral with my vocation: what I experience of availability and love towards others is what I also experience for Guido, they are two things interpenetrated, at the same level, even if with some differences”.
(23.07.1983)
Sandra knows the "need for infinity" that is within her and that is within each person. A need that “cannot be pretended to ignore” . A need that drives her to look at the sky and wait for God.
“Sandra, love everything you do. Love to the full the minutes you live, which you are allowed to live. Try to feel the joy of the present moment, whatever it is, to never miss the coincidence.
(14.10.1981)
« She got up early, early in the morning, to find herself alone in meditation, perhaps in the dark, in front of the Blessed Sacrament, before others arrived at the church. - reports his uncle Don Giuseppe - On the first day of the year, from one to two in the morning, he stood before Jesus in adoration. She loved to pray sitting on the ground, as a sign of humility and poverty ».
"Thank you, Lord, because I have received beautiful things from life so far, I have everything, but above all I thank you because you have revealed yourself to me, because I have known you"
(5/12/1977)
Sandra does well in school, loves to paint, learns to play the piano and runs as a sprinter in an athletics team.
At 12, a fundamental meeting. The one with Fr. Oreste Benzi and the Pope John XXIII Community, a community whose vocation consists in " conforming one's life to Jesus and directly sharing the life of the least, placing one's life with theirs and taking charge of their situation ". Here Sandra fulfills her Christian vocation and, deeply united to the Lord, she does her utmost to transmit divine love to the poor, the abandoned and drug addicts.
She enrolled in the Faculty of Medicine at the University of Bologna in 1980. She divided time between study, family, work and sharing with the poor. Despite the large amount of work he never neglects her studies: at each exam he scores excellent marks.
The engagement
In February 1978 she met Guido, to whom she got engaged the following year, when Sandra turned 18. Guido, older than two years, is attracted by her depth, her sympathy and her willingness to refer to God for every choice. Together they frequent the youth group of Fr. Benzi's community. The engagement is not experienced as an arrangement, an end, a closure, but as a broader horizon to open up to the space of God's infinite love. Sandra experiences her being engaged as a realization of God's plan that does not compromise her own. dedication to the Lord and neighbor.
“Engagement: something integral with my vocation: what I experience of availability and love towards others is what I also experience for Guido, they are two things interpenetrated, at the same level, even if with some differences”.
(23.07.1983)
Sandra knows the "need for infinity" that is within her and that is within each person. A need that “cannot be pretended to ignore” . A need that drives her to look at the sky and wait for God.
“Sandra, love everything you do. Love to the full the minutes you live, which you are allowed to live. Try to feel the joy of the present moment, whatever it is, to never miss the coincidence.
(14.10.1981)
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