RIVER WEST — Chicagoans will have the opportunity to see a saint in person on Monday.
With a police escort, the body of St. Maria Goretti is scheduled to visit St. John Cantius Church, 825 N. Carpenter St., at 6:30 a.m.
She will be welcomed by a series of events that are rarely celebrated in the Catholic church today.
Beginning with a sung English mass celebrated by the Rev. Carlos Martins of the Vatican's Treasures of the Church office upon arrival, visitors can also attend a Latin high mass scheduled for 7:30 p.m. that evening by the Rev. Joseph Perry, auxiliary Bishop of Chicago, with the Chicago Police Honor Guard in attendance.
Visitors will see a wax statue encased in a glass coffin containing the saint's decomposed remains during the public viewing that will immediately begin after the 6:30 a.m. English mass. Viewing lasts until 6 a.m. Tuesday, when the relics will be transported to St. John Vianney Church in Northlake, for veneration there.
St. Goretti died at the age of 11 on July 6, 1902, after being stabbed 14 times in an attempted rape. She is the youngest saint to be canonized by the Catholic church. Her mother, Assunta Goretti, was present at her canonization in 1950. The glass casket is the same that she had seen her daughter in when she was canonized. St. Goretti is considered the patron saint of youth and young people.
The visit is only the second time the saint's remains had left Rome, and the first time she is in Chicago and the United States. The visit is part of a tour that started with a private stop at Sing Sing Correctional Facility in Ossining, New York on Sept. 20.
Visits are also planned to St. Francis of Assissi Church in suburban Orland Park on Wednesday, and St. Mary Immaculate Church in Plainfield on Thursday.
Currently, the saint's remains are at Sts. Cyril and Methodius church in Sterling Heights, Michigan, north of Detroit, where public viewing had started at 9 a.m. Saturday. The relics will then move to St. Scholastica Church in Detroit, where veneration starts at 10 a.m. Sunday.
The tour is in tandem with the church's 2015 theme Year of Mercy, and coordinated by Martins as well as the Vatican's Congregation for the Causes of Saints office.
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