Josephine Cauli: Pinuccia
Giuseppina Cauli – with dark and profound eyes, her height 165, a striking presence! When, crossing the threshold of the House of the Pious Disciples of the Divine Master in Via Portuense (Rome), when you encounter her, you would not easily forget her. To meet Pinuccia meant to encounter a gift of joy. The smile that shone on her face and her profound gaze left a deep memory!
She came from Sardinia where she was born on February 22nd, 1943, to Emilio and Orrù Ignazia, in Lunamatrona (Cagliari). Pinuccia was the fifth of the 8 living children. On her deathbed, her mother wrote:
” I am sure that Pinuccia is in Heaven and crowned with her other three brothers and two little sisters: we have six angels in Paradise. I think that as parents, we are rich in front of God.”
She was baptized in the parish of St. John the Baptist on February 27th, 1943, and received the Sacrament of Confirmation on November 13th, 1949, from His Excellency Msgr. Antonio Tedde. Her baptism was truly one that blossomed into her vocation and mission, so dearly loved by her.
Lunamatrona is a town with many buildings that go back to two thousand years before Christ. These clusters of stones help form the characters of the people, imparting qualities of strength and fortitude. This is what was captured in the very young Josephine who, with a crystal-clear will, entered religious life at the age of twelve on December 3rd, 1955. She began her journey with her gaze oriented forward as if she knew where she was going. She seemed to see beyond the here and now.
Accompanied by Sr. M. Gesualda Serra she was welcomed to Rome by the Superior General Mother M. Lucia Ricci and the community. It was the custom to present the new vocations to Mother Lucia on her feastday.
Soon after the feast of St Lucia she joined Mother Lucia with a group of very young aspirants of Cinisello Balsamo. In this group Josephine was a reference person. She was slightly older than the others, but with a maturity that gave was worthy of example. She was someone who could be trusted. You could have a laugh with her, talk and joke together: she was very good company.
Despite being young, Pinuccia possessed a large vision of the world. She understood the Lord’s call and wanted to respond to it, she expanded her heart to accept the specific mission of the Pious Disciples. She repeated and wrote like Mary, like Our Lady: “I want to follow Jesus the Master!”. She was a luminous presence and attracted the kindness of all. This emerged from her interior life and from closeness to Jesus.
Her interior life blossomed at a young age. It was beautiful, a beauty that was born from the inside. Pinuccia possessed the qualities of the Pious Disciple who desires to live her vocation and carry out her specific mission of love for prayer. She lived in silence and was a serene person, always willing to dialogue in the community. Her gaze was gentle. She knew instinctively when to intervene and serve.
This small and daily service opened her to a vision of the apostolate and of the mission, especially towards priests. Through the gift of the Holy Spirit, she possessed the innocence of the little ones and the courage of adults. Pinuccia truly corresponded to God’s grace, making a long journey in a short time.
Her formation process continued. After six months of postulancy as was the custom in those days, she did the religious vestition in Alba on 12th September 1959. She began her novitiate in Rome on March 24th, 1960.
Apparently healthy, but with some symptoms that needed attention, following her postulancy, she spent a month in Sanfre, the nursing home of the Congregation. However, the investigation did not warrant any concern. Sr. M. Panaghia Ghigi, the formator in charge of the group, had confided to us that Pinuccia was willing to offer her life for her father who had not attended Church for many years. In fact, she prayed and offered much for her father’s conversion.
In April 1960 she was struck by a very serious disease: she had a cardiovascular collapse with double pneumonia and other complications. Those short days of serious illness that struck the novice Sr. Giuseppina Cauli were filled with pain and peace, of shadows as vivid as light, of a confidence that kept her trust alive. She was enlightened by faith.
She was the first to announce that she “was leaving” because “Jesus called her”. It is a simple and wonderful story, which helps us to savor the presence of God in our midst. Saturday in Albis, April 23rd, 1960, Pinuccia, together with her novitiate companions “felt” the approach of this important Sunday for all novices. It is a significant day each year for those, who with their “pure” voices, sing the ever fascinating “Quasi modo geniti infantes“. She had learned it and continued to sing it with her own harmonious and beautiful voice. She said to the novice mistress, Mother Tecla Molino (+7.7.2013):
Her eyes and face shone with a total suffusion of joy, as if she had been waiting for this moment. A collapse occurred which, seriously weakened her, leaving her with a lucidity of mind and desire, that can only be explained in a supernatural way. She was administered the Holy Oils, the Viaticum, and made her Profession “in articulo mortis“.
She was given the name: “Maria Lucia”. “Give me the intentions for my offering …” She was given the following intentions: Church of the Divine Master, the Pauline meeting which was taking place, the final approval of the Constitutions and intentions for Vocations. Transported to the nearby clinic “Mater Gratiae” she edified those who came near her with her gracefulness, kindness, and the serene and generous awareness with which she offered her life.
In the early hours of Monday, April 25th, precisely at 3 a.m., the singing of the Magnificat began, repeating with greater clarity and sweet insistence: “esurientes implevit bonis … et exaltavit humiles“. It continued to flow from her lips as an anticipation of the music of Heaven: alleluia, alleluia.
At 6.15 pm on Tuesday, April 26th, 1960, the feast of Our Lady of Good Counsel, she serenely breathed her last. She was 17 years and two months. Sister Pinuccia combined the innocence of a girl without blemish, a virginal strength, and a profound level of maturity. In the prayer book she kept an image that was written to her by Mother M. Lucia Ricci for the Immaculate Conception in 1958:
“May the Immaculate grant you to be able to live ‘without blemish’, to please Jesus, so that your life be a pure offering for many souls, especially for the sanctification of priests”.
Father Alberto Barbieri, who followed her in the short and critical course of the illness, was present at her death and during the Funeral Mass. He celebrated the Mass in the Chapel of General House and said among many other things: “The Novices have a beautiful soul that prays for them – let’s say more willingly, a very young woman, who invites them to follow the vocation that Jesus gave them in the threefold apostolate, so distinctive, so complete: Eucharistic – Priestly – Liturgical, in a total and complete love for this vocation – for the Institute – for this specific apostolate, with its own and personal nuances, made of generosity, serenity and joy. It does not matter the age, the great works done, the noises one makes. Before God it is the flower that gives its entire fragrance, its perfume”.
Pinuccia’s father was at her funeral and, following the death of his daughter, he made his confession and received communion. Her novitiate companions and other sisters testify to her extraordinary generosity and her goodness: she always noticed if someone needed help.
Pinuccia, you have passed among us as a serene reflection of God’s goodness, beauty, and simplicity! Having you with us was an experience of peace and light that urges us to be better persons before God.
4 Comments
Grazie per la storia di Pinuccia, ha ispirato tantissime di noi che l’abbiamo conosciuta .
Possa inspirare nuove giovani a seguire Gesu’ Maestro
Thank you dear Sr Tiziana. May dear Pinuccia intercede for an adundance of new vocations!
I feel Sr. Pinuccia was a living saint. Thank you Sr. Pinuccia for your generous gift to our PDDM family.
Sr. Juliana.
Thanks to the commission for bringing into light the life of Sr pinuccia.
Thank you Sr pinuccia for your Amazing testimony of life and presence. Intercede for us from heaven