About St. Maria Goretti
Maria Teresa Goretti was born in Corinaldo, Italy, on October 16th 1890. She was the second child of Luigi Goretti and Assunta Carlini. By the time she was six, her family had become so poor that they were forced to give up their farm, move, and work for other farmers. Soon, Maria's Father became sick. He died when Maria was nine.

Her brother, mother and sisters would work in the fields and Maria would cook, sew, and keep house. It was a hard life, but the family was very close. They shared a deep love for God and the faith. She and her family moved to le Ferriere di Conca, near modern Latina, where they lived in a building they shared with another family, the Serenelli's.

On July 5, 1902, finding eleven-year old Maria alone sewing, with her toddler sister, Teresa, sleeping nearby, Alessandro Serenelli attempted to force himself on the girl; however, she would not submit, protesting that what he wanted to do was a sin and warning Alessandro that he'd go to Hell if he raped her. Serenelli at first choked Maria, but when she insisted she would rather die than submit to him, he stabbed her 11 times. The injured but still-living Maria tried to reach the door, so Serenelli stabbed her 3 more times before running away.

Teresa awoke with the noise and started crying, and when Serenelli's father and Maria's mother came to check on the little girl, they found the bleeding Maria and took her to the nearest hospital in Nettuno. She underwent surgery without anesthesia, but her injuries were already beyond anything the doctors could do. The following day, twenty hours after the attack, having expressed forgiveness for her murderer and stating that she wanted to have him in heaven with her, Maria died of her injuries.

Alessandro Serenelli was captured shortly after Maria's death. Originally, he was going to be sentenced to death, but since he was a minor at that time the sentence was commuted for 30 years in prison. He remained unrepentant and uncommunicative from the world, for three years. One night, however, he had a dream of Maria offering him 14 lilies for the 14 times she was stabbed. Following this dream, he became deeply repentant.

After his release, Serenelli went to Maria's still-living mother, Assunta, and begged her forgiveness. She forgave him, saying that if Maria had forgiven him on her deathbed then she couldn't do less, and they attended Mass together the next day, receiving Holy Communion side by side.

On June 24, 1950, Pope Pius XII canonized Saint Maria Goretti as a virgin and martyr saint of the Roman Catholic Church. Maria's mother, nicknamed "Mamma Assunta" by her neighbors, was present at the ceremony; she was the first mother ever to attend the canonization ceremony of her child, along with her four remaining sons and daughters. Serenelli also was present at the canonization. He became a Capuchin laybrother, living in a convent and working as its receptionist and gardener, and died peacefully in 1970. Saint Maria Goretti's feast day is July 6.

She's represented in media as a wavy-haired young girl in farmer clothes or a white dress, with a bouquet of lillies in her hands, and is sometimes counted among the ranks of the Passionist order since her spiritual formation was guided by the Passionists.

St. Maria Goretti is the patron saint of: Crime victims, teenage girls, Modern Youth, Children of Mary.

Information was taken from Wikipedia.org.