St. Frances Xavier Cabrini (July 15, 1850 – December 22, 1917) was born in the village of Sant'Angelo Lodigiano, Italy. Young Frances dreamed of being a missionary. She was educated to be a teacher by the Daughters of the Sacred Heart, but was refused entry to the order due to her poor health. Instead, she worked as a teacher and administrator at an orphanage in Cadogno, Italy, run by the Sisters of Providence. In September 1877, she made her vows there and took the religious habit, adding Xavier to her name in honor of St. Francis Xavier.
When the orphanage closed in 1880, she founded the Institute of the Missionary Sisters of the Sacred Heart of Jesus. In 1887, St. Frances Xavier Cabrini sought an audience with Pope Leo XIII, to seek permission to go as missionaries to China. He famously told her to go “not to the East, but to the West,” and in 1889 she and six other sisters departed for New York, to serve Italian immigrants in the United States. However, anti-Italian and anti-immigrant attitudes were prevalent at the time, even in the Church. When she arrived, the archbishop advised her to go back to Italy. Undeterred, she provided education and healthcare within the Italian Catholic immigrant community.
At first, St. Frances Xavier Cabrini followed and served Italian immigrant populations, from New York to Chicago, and across the U.S., becoming a U.S. Citizen in 1909. Eventually she also founded institutions in Central and South America and Europe. Overall, she established 67 schools, hospitals, and orphanages. She was also known for her deep spirituality, often entering a trancelike state during the Exposition of the Blessed Sacrament.
She died in her own Columbus Hospital in Chicago, Illinois. She was canonized in 1946 by Pope Pius XII, the first United States citizen to be canonized. She is the Universal Patron of Immigrants. St. Frances Xavier Cabrini, Pray for us!