Beata Mercedes de Jesús

Our Founder

She was born on February 20, 1828, in the canton of Baba. She is the last daughter of Mr. Miguel Molina and Mrs. Rosa Ayala, both natives of Guayaquil. She was baptized in Pueblo Viejo with the name María de las Mercedes. The beautiful girl captivates the hearts of her parents and siblings.

At the age of 2, her beloved father passes away, leaving her under the care and protection of her mother. After this unfortunate event, Doña Rosa moves with her children to Guayaquil to educate them according to their social status. Mercedes receives her intellectual formation at home, with private tutors, thanks to her social class and economic comfort. Her mother taught her to “be firm in her purposes, loyal in her feelings, and let the truth dwell on her lips” (A1 1,60).

At 15, she experiences the painful blow of her dear mother’s death, filling her heart with unspeakable sadness. Faith in God and the Virgin Mary helps her overcome this deep emotional crisis. She returns to Baba with her siblings, María and Miguel. When they start their own families, Mercedes decides to move to Guayaquil and joins the family of Mrs. Rosalía Aguirre de Olmos, sharing family and social life with them for 5 years.

When her sister María returns to Guayaquil, Mercedes goes back to her family. She is happy sharing life with her nieces and the people in her social circle. She resumes participating in social events and gatherings, showcasing her natural charms enriched by her social position. She then becomes engaged to a young man from the Guayaquil aristocracy. She only thinks about the preparations and the wedding day.

In God’s plans, another, stronger love is knocking at the door of her heart. One day, in deep reflection, looking at the Crucifix, she feels such a strong grace impulse that she falls to her knees and vows chastity, renouncing marriage and, in an act of total surrender, consecrates her life definitively to Jesus, who captivates her in the depths of her being.

Works

Mercedes begins a new life program: prayer and service to others inside and outside the home. She seeks to identify herself with Christ, who reciprocates with special graces and gifts. Among them, He gives her the “vision of the Rosebush,” the inspiration for the new Institute. The vision of Jesus carrying the cross on the way to Calvary, where she should lay the foundations of the Institute she would found.

Passionate for Jesus, in her desire to respond more fully to the demands of the Beloved, Mercedes decides on final renunciation and leaves her sister Maria’s house. She lacks the courage to say goodbye, leaves a letter, and goes to live in a poor place known as the “House of the Gathered.” There, she cares for orphaned girls with her motherly tenderness, displaying exquisite kindness and maternal care to those lacking all love. She teaches them to read, write, and do handicrafts.

Mercedes receives a new call from God. In an attitude of availability, she interprets the Divine Will in the invitation of Father Domingo García, her spiritual director, to the missions in the Ecuadorian East. She decides to undertake this itinerant journey with two young companions. After several days of fatigue, overcoming countless dangers, they reach the mission. Mercedes starts her apostolic action among the Shuar brothers, offering them her love and trust.

When a black smallpox outbreak occurs among the indigenous people, Mercedes becomes the charitable and efficient nurse to heal their bodies and thus reach their hearts and souls. When a civil war breaks out between two indigenous tribes, Mercedes dedicates herself to writing the Constitutions of the new Institute she must found.

Mercedes knows how to inquire about God’s will through the Bishop of Cuenca, who asks her to take charge of an orphanage. With great pain, she leaves the mission and goes where obedience calls her. She receives orphaned and poor girls and believes that Cuenca is not the place for the foundation of the Institute. She is certain of the mission that God entrusts to her but does not know the time and place. She trusts in God and waits against all hope. She knows that God leads the way for His chosen ones.

Father García asks Mercedes to leave Cuenca and go to Riobamba… The foundation is looming. Mercedes embarks on the journey with four young women. She arrives in Riobamba on January 13. Monsignor Ordóñez, Bishop of the Diocese of Riobamba, takes her to the place that God had prepared for her to plant her Rosebush. Overcoming difficulties, the long-awaited day finally dawns when the dreamed-of Institute takes shape in history on April 14, 1873, Easter Monday. Monsignor receives the vows of the first four Marianitas. With the approval of Monsignor, the new Institute “Mariana de Jesús” is founded.

The mission of the “spiritual mother” of her religious and orphaned girls forming the nascent community begins. Her apostolic zeal leads her to receive poor girls with whom she establishes the orphanage and starts “Christian education.” Mercedes takes care of the youngest girls. She forms them all in virtue and knowledge. She, a living school of virtues, is the model for the missions and tasks of the Institute: Superior, Treasurer, Nurse, Educator, Trainer, and Mother of orphans.

Mercedes has fulfilled the mission entrusted to her by God. Her entire life has been a continuous ascent towards the Beloved who once captivated her heart. Her will has merged with that of God, “I want what God wants.” On June 12, 1883, Mercedes takes her definitive flight to heaven to meet the Beloved of her soul.

Today, her presence continues to live and act in her daughters and in her works, extending her charisma and Evangelizing Action on the 5 continents. His Holiness John Paul II beatified her in her native land, Guayaquil, Ecuador, on February 1, 1985. He declared her feast day on June 12, the day she ascended to the Father’s House. We trust in God’s merciful love that He may grant us the prompt Canonization of Blessed Mercedes de Jesús, a model of Christian and religious life.

Quotes

  • “I want what God wants; I am ready to accept everything.”
  • “Yes, very much, I love Him a lot. If I don’t love God, whom shall I love?”
  • “We must look at others with the tenderness with which God looks at them.”
  • “This congregation will spread widely because the rosebush that the Lord showed me was great… it will not be extinguished because this foundation is not the work of men but of God.”
  • “I feel the presence of God like a lightning that reflects its gleam in my soul, but it passes so quickly, like the light of the same lightning.”
  • “If your eye were pure, your whole body would be illuminated.”
  • “If you love me, let me desire to suffer something for God [says to the girls].”
  • “Yes, very much, I love Him a lot. If I don’t love God, whom shall I love?”
  • “What do you think, sister? For whom are you doing that, sister? […] I wanted God to be the only love of the young girls. If you love me, let me desire to suffer something for God” [to the orphaned girls].
  • “On the day of judgment, we will give an account to God for useless words.”
  • “My Jesus, I love you. My spouse, you already know how much I love you, I desire you, I sigh for you, come soon, my love.”
  • “Come, my love, come, my spouse, you already know that I love you, I desire you, my love, You are my good, my comfort, my Jesus.”
  • “I want what God wants; I am ready to accept everything.”
  • “I have no preference for any, all offices are indifferent to me.”

Canonization

Saints and saints have always been a source and origin of renewal in the most difficult circumstances of the history of the Church.

By canonizing certain faithful, that is, by solemnly proclaiming that these faithful have heroically practiced virtues and have lived in fidelity to God’s grace, the Church recognizes the power of the Spirit of holiness within her and sustains the hope of the faithful by proposing the saints as models and intercessors (cf LG 40; 48-51). “The saints and the saints have always been a source and origin of renewal in the most difficult circumstances of the history of the Church” (CL 16, 3). Indeed, “the holiness of the Church is the secret source and infallible measure of her apostolic zeal and her missionary fervor” (CL 17, 3).

Stages in the Canonization Process

  1. Servant of God.
  2. Venerable.
  3. Blessed.
  4. Saint.

In the case of Blessed Mother Mercedes de Jesús, a second miracle is needed to lead her to be (canonized) recognized by the Universal Church as a saint. Therefore, we invite you to seek her intercession.

How to Seek the Intercession of Mother Mercedes

  • Through prayer and/or a novena in honor of Mother Mercedes de Jesús, performing it with great faith and love.
  • You can request the image and novena of Mother Mercedes in Marianitas communities.

Prayer for the Canonization of Blessed Mercedes de Jesús

Oh Lord! Through the intercession of Blessed Mercedes de Jesús, grant us:

  • Blessings and graces to families,
  • Health and strength to the sick,
  • Protection for children and youth,
  • Shelter for the elderly and abandoned,
  • Peace and faith to the whole world. Holy Father, in your infinite goodness, allow your Church to glorify Blessed Mercedes de Jesús, granting us her prompt canonization. Oh good Jesus, hear us. Oh good Jesus, listen to us. Amen.

Miracle Leading to Beatification

Regarding miracles, among the many attributed to the intercession of the Venerable Mother Mercedes de Jesús Molina, the promoters of the cause presented the miraculous healing, as a sort of revival, of the three-year-old girl Zoila Elena Cáceres Larrea. This girl, on March 11, 1965, while her mother was absent, had ingested about twelve pieces of cheese sprinkled with deadly poison intended to kill mice.

 

Without any antidote being used, and with doctors predicting a fatal outcome, with only the confident invocation of Venerable Mercedes de Jesús Molina, the girl completely recovered, somehow coming back to life. Investigations into the supernatural nature of this healing were carried out at the Curia of Riobamba in the years 1974 and 1975.

The Medical Board of the Congregation for the Causes of Saints, on May 6, 1983, declared that this admirable event had occurred in a manner beyond the order and forces of nature. Similar opinions were expressed in the special meeting of the congregation on March 6 and in the plenary session on May 22. On June 9 of the same year, having received the entire matter, we declared that in the examined case, it is indeed a true miracle due to the intercession of the venerable Servant of God Mercedes de Jesús Molina.

Having fulfilled all the requirements, on February 1, 1985, during our apostolic journey through the Ecuadorian Republic, within the solemn Eucharistic concelebration held on the immense plain known as Los Samanes in the city of Guayaquil, in the presence of a large number of bishops, priests, nuns, and an enormous crowd of believers, we declared the Venerable Servant of God as Blessed with the following words: We, embracing the desire of our brother Leónidas Proaño Villalba, Bishop of Riobamba, and of many other brothers in the episcopate, and numerous faithful; after hearing the opinion of the sacred congregation for the causes of the saints, declare with our apostolic authority that the venerable Servant of God, Mercedes de Jesús Molina y Ayala, can be, from now on, called blessed, and that her feast can be celebrated in places and in the manner established by law, on June twelfth, the day of her birth into heaven. (Excerpt from the Miracle, taken from the Book of Beatification, 1993) Cardinal Agustín Casaroli Secretary of State.