Today we celebrate, with this article, our brother Father G.B. Manzella: an unforgettable model in the Synod Church!
In the synodal journey of today’s Church, Father John Baptist Manzella presents himself to us as a sublime and unforgettable model to which we can refer, embodying a lofty priestly and missionary ideal. One cannot imagine him in solitude, but always in company with the neighbour he met.
Having allowed himself to be moulded by the teachings of Saint Vincent de Paul, his whole life was oriented towards ‘travelling, following the example of Christ himself and his disciples, through the villages and hamlets to break the bread of God’s word to the poor through preaching and catechesis; …, founding the Company of Charity; taking on the direction of seminaries … and teaching them‘. Saint John Paul II himself interpreted this in his words addressed to the Sardinian bishops on the occasion of the first ‘ad limina‘ visit in 1981: ‘I cannot fail to recall the assiduous and unforgettable work of Mr Manzella, the apostle of Sardinia, who catechised for about forty years, travelling the length and breadth of the island …’.
He was born in Soncino (Cremona) on 21 January 1855 and died in Sassari on 23 October 1937, unanimously believed to be in the concept of sanctity. In his younger years, having obtained his Technical Licence in 1871 and while his younger brother Ezechiele had already entered the Cremona Seminary, he followed his family to Castello sopra Lecco, finding work as a clerk in a hardware shop. His father Carlo, in addition to his job as mattress maker, helped in the parish as sacristan, and so he too, together with his older brother Luigi, worked in the church in the mornings and evenings, attracting the trust and friendship of the parish priest. Every evening, the family ‘would gather for the quilt work (especially in winter) and one of them would read aloud the Holy Bible, which they bought in handouts and read it four times in its entirety and with annotations’.
To enter the seminary, he had to wait for his little brother Ezechiele to be ordained a priest; thus in 1984, at the age of 29, he was able to enter the Villoresi Institute in Monza, a seminary intended for poor clerics and adult vocations. Guided by his spiritual director, he also matured his Vincentian choice there: thus on 2 November 1887 he presented himself at the Mission House in Turin and on 21 November he took the religious habit in the Novitiate in Chieri.
Here he literally let himself be moulded by the Rules of St Vincent, which hinged on conformation to Christ Jesus through the ‘five Vincentian virtues‘: humility, simplicity, meekness, mortification and zeal for the salvation of souls. In the six years of his formation for the priesthood, he progressed so much in these virtues that his entire life and apostolate was profoundly marked by them. He was 38 years old when he was ordained a priest on 25 February 1893 in the chapel of the archiepiscopal seminary in Turin.
The first seven years of his priesthood saw him almost totally involved in the formation of young people: in Scarnafigi (CN), in Chieri as novice master, in Como where he had his first impact with missionary preaching in the parishes, and in Casale Monferrato (1899-1900), disciplinary director and bursar of the Diocesan Seminary. Here the seminarians immediately became aware that they were dealing with a holy missionary.
In November 1900 he was transferred to Sassari, spiritual director of the clerics of the Turritano Provincial Seminary. “This time I am sending you as spiritual director of the seminary Mr Manzella, a holy missionary…,” was the provincial superior’s note of introduction to the archbishop of Sassari.
From the very first meeting, the clerics were won over by his humble, simple and convinced style. His formative action in the five years spent in the seminary remained with them forever.
In 1904, he also undertook, with great fruit, the preaching of the first missions to the people and was assigned full-time the following year. Thus began the most intense period of his missionary ministry in Sardinia, which would last to some extent until his death. From 1906 to 1912, he was also the superior of the town’s Vincentian community, without giving up missionary preaching. He reserved the most demanding ones for opposing atheistic and anticlerical socialism, as he did in Pozzomaggiore, Tempio Pausania, Castelsardo, Alghero, Bonorva, Ittiri, Sindia and Portotorres. This anticlerical social climate was also present in Sassari, so that already in 1908 he felt the urgency of a Catholic newspaper to oppose the prevailing ‘La nuova Sardegna’. On Sunday, 13 March 1910, the first issue of ‘La Libertà’ came out. Together with him, the young canon Damiano Filia and lawyer Giovanni Zirolia were part of the editorial staff; but also Don Sebastiano Pola, the young Remo Branca and Antonio Segni, and others collaborated.
He was an authentic innovator of the popular missions in Sardinia with his ingenious inventions based on the evangelical simplicity of preaching to make himself understood even by the illiterate. He introduced a special evening lecture for men only to defend them from the influence of the atheistic and anticlerical socialism prevailing at the time, as well as the involvement of children, whom he knew how to attract in a growing stream to the sound of the famous ‘trumpet‘. He also invented ‘home fishing‘ especially for those ‘far away‘ from sacramental practice, to whom he dedicated his free time, in search of the ‘ninety-nine lost sheep...’, as he used to say.
Almost always, preaching also ended with the foundation of charitable groups, both female and male, or other social works: kindergartens, of which he was a true pioneer in Sardinia, and orphanages. He also made Christian Doctrine Associations, Rural Banks and even ‘Pietadine’ flourish to combat the Sardinian mourning that deprived women of sacramental and ecclesiastical life even for several years.
His missionary apostolate was always sprinkled with prayer, both personal and of those pious souls he knew how to involve from a distance, but also with continuous voluntary mortifications and particular penances he imposed on himself. But also unfailing was the “miraculous medal” of the Immaculate Conception, which he spread everywhere, especially in the most difficult cases of obstinate sinners who often resolved themselves in confession, opening themselves up to divine mercy.
The people soon realised that they would find in him a true man of God and a zealous priest unlike any other. Thus Father Manzella became one of the best known and most desired personalities in Sardinia. He travelled the length and breadth of the island many times, by every means of transport: on foot, on horseback, by cart or gig, and, with progress, by car and train. Even the railway carriage was often transformed into a place for small catechesis, with the help of biblical posters or the distribution of Our Lady’s medal to all.
Popular missions, however, did not exhaust the ministry of the Servant of God. A worthy son of Saint Vincent, through missionary preaching he succeeded in creating a dense regional network of Charitable Groups, prophetic of our parish Caritas introduced by Saint Paul VI. In Sardinia, more than 200 were counted due to the activities of Manzelli and his brothers. First in Italy, he animated all his Groups with the monthly periodical “La Carità“, personally taking care of its formative and apostolic content, as well as its printing for 15 years, from 1923 to 1935.
Thus, in 1923 and 1925, Sardinia was recognised by the Vincentian Central Council of Paris as the world primacy in Charity; and the Superior General of the Missionaries Mr. Francis Verdier, after a visit to the Island from the 22nd to the 28th of October 1923, officially proclaimed Sardinia “Vincentian Island“.
The foundation of charitable and welfare institutes was also particularly congenial to him: in Sassari he was recognised as the founder of the Casa Divina Provvidenza (1903), the Rifugio Gesù Bambino (1910), the Istituto dei Sordomuti (1911) and the Istituto dei Ciechi (1934). The charitable institutions of Bonorva, Olbia, Tempio, Oschiri, Luras, Villanova Monteleone, etc. also referred to him. He truly knew how to be a formidable organiser of Charity and assistance to the needy, fully involving charitable groups and the Daughters of Charity.
In Sassari, he was known as the friend of the poor, who flocked to him wherever he was: to the Mission House, to the Mother House of his Sisters, to the Turritano Seminary, where he returned from 1926 to 1934, when he was not looking for them directly in their hovels. He never denied them alms; he even helped them by pawning his watch to the baker or by depriving himself of shoes and even trousers to dress the naked. At his funeral, he was remembered by the city’s archbishop as ‘the embodiment of charity and mercy‘.
Trainer of clergy, clerics and others
In his manifold apostolate, much time was also dedicated to priests and clerics and seminarians, especially with the 
preaching of annual and monthly retreats, which were in great demand in almost all Sardinian dioceses: from Sassari to Ozieri, Nuoro, Alghero, Tempio, Bosa, Cagliari and Iglesias. He often even preached two courses, one after the other, in the same diocese. His reflections were very practical, trying to instil in priests a strong yearning for holiness and love for the Eucharist.
Of the clerics and seminarians he managed to be above all the ‘father’ who encouraged them to respond faithfully to the vocation they had received. In particular, he dedicated three periods of his life to them: the first years of his priesthood on the continent, then, in two stages, another 12 years in Sassari: from 1900 to 1905 and from 1926 to 1934. But even his occasional presence at other times was always desired. He enlightened their minds on the greatness and sublimity of the priestly vocation; he knew how to transfuse into their souls that living faith that reverberated from his life, leading them to encounter the living Jesus in the Eucharist, to the point of making him their confidant, their friend, their everything.
Upon his death, the ‘Pastor bonus‘, a bulletin for the Vocations Work in Sardinia, was entitled: ‘Clerics and priests have lost a great friend‘.
Another significant aspect of his priesthood was the spiritual direction of numerous chosen souls, among them the Servant of God Leontina Sotgiu (1882-1957) and the mystic Angela Marongiu (1854-1936), his right-hand woman in the foundation of the Sisters of Gethsemane. He was also a convinced admirer and confidant of Blessed Hedwig Carboni (1880-1952) during the years she lived in Pozzomaggiore (SS).
Wherever she preached, she knew how to identify young souls who were enthusiastic about the ideal of virginal consecration, forming them spiritually and directing them either to the cloistered life or to the service of the poor among the Daughters of Charity, or, remaining a ‘virgin in the century‘, committing them to the parish apostolate. He always knew how to be a sure spiritual guide. Thanks to his zeal as a vocational animator, dozens and dozens of vocations to the consecrated life, but also to the priesthood, were aroused by him. Even in the last years of his life, he gathered about forty young ladies monthly in the Mother House of “St. Teresa”, of whom a number later formed, on his initiative, the Company of the Sisters of St. Angela Merici in Porto Torres (1936).
But the masterpiece of his vocational pastoral work was the foundation of the Gethsemane Sisters on Pentecost 1927. It was a project that matured slowly, the fruit of his leadership.
Having spiritually followed, one by one, the first young women and completed an initial construction of the Motherhouse, at the age of 72, despite numerous criticisms from the well-thinking who tried to dissuade him, he started the Institute of the Sisters of Gethsemane, combining Mother Angela’s contemplative project with his own of the apostolate to the abandoned in the countryside or in parishes.
By 1932 it could be seen that they had reached a good level of spiritual and community maturity. Thus on 1 January 1936 the first sisters made their perpetual religious profession; on Corpus Christi day (11 June) 1936 they received the religious habit.
The great reputation for holiness
If the entire life of the Servant of God was already permeated by great virtue, in his last years his great reputation for holiness was manifested everywhere, which was also accompanied by thaumaturgical episodes, brought about especially through the miraculous medal that he distributed to the sick and to anyone who recommended themselves to his prayers, asking him for a particular blessing.
In September 1930, at the International Congress in Paris for the centenary of the apparitions of the Miraculous Medal, in which she participated with a pilgrimage of Daughters of Mary and Ladies of Charity, she candidly reported: “We in Sassari impose the miraculous medal on a paralytic and say to him: get up and walk, and the paralytic gets up and walks away safe and sound!
In 1933, the bishop of Bosa, Monsignor Nicolò Frazioli, had invited the Servant of God for a spiritual retreat for the seminarians: ‘As soon as the news spread that Mr Manzella had arrived, there was a rush of people such as I had never seen in Bosa. A veritable torrent of people poured into the seminary, occupying the whole of the main door and its surroundings, the stairs and even the corridor, up to the door of the chapel where he preached. Everyone wanted to see him, to hear a word from him, to receive comfort, a blessing“.
From 1934 onwards, due to the numbness of his feet, he took to travelling around the city and the surrounding area in his famous donkey-drawn buggy. People revered him as he passed; mothers presented their children to him for a blessing. The nun who accompanied him left this description: ‘What my eyes saw in those two and a half years were such beautiful things to weep over; heaven on earth. One mounted the cart; I lashed the donkey, but one could not proceed. Everyone would stop him: ‘Mr Manzella, bless me; give me your hand to kiss, put your hand on this child’s head!’ The poor would ask for an alms, the students close to the exam a blessing; some unemployed people would even ask him to let them take their photograph so that they could make a living from it. … Even the little ones in the arms of their mothers he lavished caresses on, the mothers themselves took them to him to be blessed, and some of them put their little ones on the donkey, saying that Father Manzella’s donkey was also a saint…’.
In November 1936, some special healings took place in Pattada (SS): ‘Two young paralytic women were promised
healing by him. Back in Pattada, they were suddenly healed, one on the 20th, the other on the 21st of the same month. The following day, an unusual sight was seen in the Mission House in Sassari. Perhaps a dozen cars, carriages and vehicles of all kinds were stationed along the boundary wall. They were people who had come from Pattada following the events of the eve to get a blessing from the missionary saint. The entrance, the parlour, the corridors, the chapel, everything was packed with sick people begging the missionary saint. He gave everyone the Medal, invited confidence, and everyone prayed as if Jesus and Our Lady were there alive and speaking without a veil. A parish priest present commented: ‘We are in Palestine…’, and his lay brother replied: ‘It is always like this’.
In July 1937, when he was invited to Calangianus (Sassari) for the feast of St Vincent, on the evening of the conclusion he brought so many sick people to the church square that it was completely filled, so that he could give them a special blessing . Here too, the parish priest’s comments were renewed: ‘Gospel scenes!
In September 1937, invited to Bultei (SS) for the conclusion of the mission preached by two worthy diocesan priests, upon his arrival in the church during the sermon it had to be suspended because the assembly of the faithful, in a sudden general buzz, stood up and turned towards the door to greet the Servant of God.
The Servant of God reacted by taking refuge in his humility and simplicity. In December 1935, writing to Mother Angela Marongiu, he mentioned to her the enthusiasm of the Ladies of Cagliari towards him: ‘The demonstrations of esteem of these good Ladies and Ladies of charity would confuse me, if I did not know myself well enough. Let God do what He wills of me’.
In May of the same year, he also communicated the same sentiments to the Servant of God Leontina Sotgiu: ‘There is an enthusiasm going around that they think I am a saint. This does not bother me because I know myself all too well. Meanwhile they leave me no time to do anything, yet I have much to do. Pray for me that I detach myself from my foolish attachments, and make me holy indeed’.
A few months before his death, he wrote to a religious superior: ‘They come from all over Sardinia. They think I am a great man, they think I am a saint. Let them say what they want, it is certain that miracles do not make a saint… Humility, charity, obedience, prompt and sincere forgiveness of offences, love of enemies, perseverance in goodness… this is holiness that I wish for myself, for you and for the whole world.
When he died on 23 October 1937, all of Sassari wanted to pay homage to him. Saint Manzella is dead!”: this is how the population greeted and commented on the mournful event. For the whole day, the Chapel of the Mission, where the body was exposed, became like the city’s sanctuary: ‘that incessant pilgrimage of praying crowds began, and from the early hours of the morning it continued to grow, in the afternoon and came towards evening to form a compact and impressive mass, an overwhelming wave contained and restrained, more than by the cordons of public force, by an intimate sense of veneration and love...’.
The following day, Mission Sunday, the procession to transport the body to the cathedral began at 9am. Despite the heavy rain, also interpreted as a gift of grace from the Servant of God, it was “so impressive that it took on more the appearance of a triumphal procession than a funeral accompaniment. Perhaps never had Sassari seen such a spontaneous crowd and a more overwhelming display of affection‘.
At the conclusion of the funeral celebration, Archbishop Monsignor Mazzotti, from the pulpit, only confirmed the people’s firm belief in the sanctity of the Servant of God. Visibly impressed, he paused to scan the crowd and said: ‘We have come together in this Cathedral Church to pay our dutiful tribute of prayers of suffrage or rather in honour of Mr Manzella. … Without hastening or anticipating the judgement of the Holy Church, we can nevertheless affirm that Mr Manzella is a saint… God alone can give external signs of this sanctity, and the Church will be the competent judge...”.
The tomb of the Servant of God immediately became the destination of a continuous pilgrimage. On the three-year anniversary of his death, the editorial of the diocesan newspaper recalled: ‘Death did not shroud him in the funereal veil of oblivion, but marked the beginning of a truly grandiose apotheosis… The uninterrupted pilgrimage of the faithful to the modest tomb is a clear confirmation of this un usurped reputation for holiness…’.
One of his disciples and confrere added these details: ‘Now the generosity of some faithful has covered it with a marble slab, surmounted by a cross between two lamps. Four words are engraved on it, the ones that could not be done without. “Sac. Giovanni Battista Manzella priest of the Mission – Founder of the Sisters of Gethsemane”. Certainly more could have been written. No matter. A little more and then the slab must be replaced by another. On the Day of the Dead, the faithful sprinkled it with small lights, the excessive heat broke it and a second one was put in immediately…”.
The graces obtained through the Servant of God’s intercession would seem to have begun already in the days of his death. In the commemoration of 1939, Canon A. Frau was able to state: ‘These prodigious events are multiplying, and from every part not only of Sardinia, but of Italy; wherever the powerful echo of the virtue of Mr Manzella has reached, the grateful testimonies of those who have had recourse to him in vain are arriving‘.
The vice-postulator of the Diocesan Informative Process, Father Antonio Sategna, published 18 of the main ones that took place in those first 10 years after the death.
In May 1941, the official petition of the Bishops of Sardinia was forwarded to the Vicar General of the Congregation of the Mission to have his Cause of Beatification introduced, motivating it ‘on the ever-increasing fame of holiness that surrounds, throughout the Island, the memory of Mr. Giovanni Battista Manzella, a member of this well-deserving Congregation’ and asking that ‘the Ven. Postulation of this Congregation would like to promote, without delay, the beginning of the cause in canonical forms’.
The following October, his remains were transferred to the crypt of the erected Church of the Most Blessed Sacrament, near the Manzellian Sisters’ Mother House, where the ever-increasing number of devotees continued to visit. The following October, his remains were transferred to the crypt of the erected Church of the Most Blessed Sacrament, near the Mother House of the Manzellian nuns, where the ever-increasing number of devotees continued to visit uninterruptedly: ‘There is hardly a sick person who comes to Sassari for treatment that is not brought to the tomb of Mr Manzella… Prodigious events are multiplying from all sides; wherever the echo of his virtue has reached, grateful testimonies arrive from those who have not turned to his intercession in vain‘.
In the 1947 commemoration, Archbishop Mazzotti costata:
“Today, ten years later, the esteem, the affection, the conviction of the holiness of the old missionary is anything but diminished. The pilgrimage to his tomb is uninterrupted, the trust in his intercession has an impressive crescendo… This morning this cathedral is gathering such a crowd that it is reminiscent of the one that attended the funeral in such great numbers. What is the secret of this popularity, of this attraction exercised by the figure of Mr Manzella? It is certainly the sanctity of his life‘.
This devout pilgrimage has never ceased. The testimonies of invocation and thanksgiving to the Servant of God number in the hundreds, preserved in the archives of the Manzellian nuns. But even in that of the Missionaries of Sassari there are more than 200, though limited to the most significant, to date.
The Servant of God still seems to respond to the invocations of the faithful, who continue to come to his tomb. It is these testimonies of graces received, to this day, that fuel his reputation for holiness. The always crowded annual commemorative celebrations tell how much he is still in the hearts of the Sassaresi, as well as of Sardinia.
