St. Gerard Majella: The Wonder-Worker and Patron of Expectant Mothers

THE Life that we are now writing is a long chain of marvels. When turning its pages, the reader will recall the act of faith which he makes every day: “I believe in God, the Father Almighty”; also the words of the Gospel: “Nothing is impossible to God” (Luke I, 37); and this promise of Jesus Christ: “He that believeth in me, the works that I do, he also shall do, and greater than these shall he do” (John XIV, 12); for the Holy Spirit declares: “God is wonderful in His saints.” (Ps. LXVII, 36.)


The blessed child whose virtues we are going to portray, was born in April, 1726, at Muro, a little village about twenty leagues south of Naples. His father, a tailor by trade, was Dominico Majella, and his mother, Benedetta Galella, both admirable for their thoroughly Christian life. The new-born babe received in Baptism the name of Gerard. From the very cradle, he gave evidence of the high sanctity to which God destined him, for never did he weep, never did he demand nourishment by his cries as do other children. On certain days, he even refused the maternal breast, a presage of the severe abstinence which he kept his whole lifelong. Benedetta wondered. She would say to him tenderly: “God bless you, dear child!” Prevented by grace from his earliest years, he found his only amusement in the little practices of devotion suited to his age. His two sisters, Brigida and Anna Elizabetta, tell us that Gerard’s only attraction when a child, was to make little altars and imitate the ceremonies of divine worship. He used to place on a table the pictures of the saints, that of St. Michael in particular, and pass and re-pass before them inclining and bowing. Then, kneeling down, he would recite some prayers, striking his breast, or singing the pious canticles that he had heard in church. His growing piety astonished and delighted all who saw it.


Gerard’s life convinces us of this truth, that God finds His delights among the children of men and in converse with them. A short distance from Muro, stands the chapel of Capotignano, where is venerated a statue of the Blessed Virgin Mary holding the Infant Jesus in her arms. When Gerard was not yet six years old, led, no doubt by a heavenly hand, he made his way to this sanctuary.


Scarcely had he knelt down when the little Jesus, leaving His Mother’s arms, came to play with him, and gave him a little loaf of extreme whiteness. The child joyfully carried the present home to his mother. In great surprise, she asked: “Who gave it to you?” “It was a beautiful lady’s Child with whom I have been playing.” Attracted by the divine charms of his heavenly Friend, Gerard ran every morning to the chapel, and each time the Infant God came down to play with him, and present to him a little white loaf. Brigida’s curiosity urged her one day to follow her little brother, and, unknown to him, she became a witness of the prodigy. The prudent mother, Benedetta, did likewise, and saw the same thing.


Following the example of her Son, the Blessed Virgin, also, desired to give Gerard the miraculous bread. The child himself revealed to us this secret. Going one day into the chapel with his mother, pointing to the statue of the Blessed Virgin, he said: “Mamma, there is the Lady who gave me bread more than once, and there is the Child with whom I have played.” Years after, when he had become a Redemptorist, his sister Brigida, having come to see him, he said to her with his usual simplicity: “I now know that it was the Infant Jesus who gave me the little white loaves.” “Well,” replied his sister smiling, “come again to see the Child.” “At present,” said Gerard, “I find Him wherever I wish.”