The new saints and the struggles for women

On October 19, 2025, Pope Leo XIV is going to canonize Vincenza Maria Poloni, María del Monte Carmelo Rendiles Martínez, and Maria Troncatti. The three women share a common thread, which is they turned faith into concrete action to improve the condition of women.

Vincenza Maria Poloni: dignity for the marginalized

Born in Verona in 1802, Vincenza Maria Poloni co-founded the Sisters of Mercy with Carlo Steeb. Together, they revolutionized how the most vulnerable women were cared for. Her work stood out for its attention to unmarried mothers, impoverished widows, and abandoned sick women. In an era of female marginalization, Sister Vincenza offered not only charity, but dignity, taught trades and provided tools for economic independence. Her sisters educated women to be self-sufficient, and whom were forerunners of modern forms of emancipation.

María del Monte Carmelo: strength in diversity

María del Monte Carmelo Rendiles Martínez was born in Caracas in 1903. Although she was born without her left arm, she transformed disability into a driving force for social change. Despite the prejudices against both women and the disabled, she founded the Congregation of the Servants of Jesus, and became a beacon for socially excluded Venezuelan women. She developed an innovative approach that demonstrated that physical difference is a resource, not a limitation. The miracle attributed to her beatification -the healing of a doctor’s arm-, symbolizes how her legacy continues to empower professional women.

Maria Troncatti: the liberator of Shuar women

Italian missionary Maria Troncatti was born in 1883 in Corteno Golgi (Brescia). She is a Daughter of Mary Help of Christians and a concrete example of the struggle for women’s rights. She arrived in Ecuador in 1922 and settled in the Amazon rainforest among the Shuar people. She fought against forced marriages, the practice that robbed young girls of the freedom to choose. Courageously, she promoted Christian marriages based on free consent, and restored to Shuar women the right to determine their own futures. Her respectful approach to local culture proved that women’s rights are universal and must be promoted in harmony with cultural specificity.