God leads us to salvation “by showing us the way that leads to Him through the testimony of the lives of His faithful children”. This is according to Cardinal Vicar Angelo de Donatis, who today opened the diocesan phase of the cause of beatification and canonization of the Servant of God Chiara Corbella Petrillo: “It is a human path that we can see and follow, because it has been walked by His only-begotten Son made man and by those who, knowing Him, have walked the path of life with Him. We need this holiness, which is the fullness of humanity made possible in our daily lives, because it comes from the Gospel that we live out together with our brothers and sisters in the faith”. According to the Cardinal, “Chiara is seen as one of us and her life fascinates us for it instils in us a desire for change, engaging many people”. “When we listen to the people who have known her – he added -, we realize that Chiara’s Christian witness is a beacon of light, which helps us to experience first hand the loving closeness of God who is our Father and to discover the beauty of the Church, which reveals herself as a mother in the fraternity of her children and care of her pastors.
Knowing her life, we see that Mary continues to generate God’s children in the Church, through the work of the Spirit, teaching them how to keep the word of the Father, to understand the meaning of events in light of this word, and how to entrust our lives to the hands of Jesus, following in His footsteps to get where He waits for us, in Love”.

“In the historical context in which we live, the pastoral care of the family is at the centre of the evangelizing efforts of the Church against the open attacks directed against her by the pseudo-culture of this world. What Chiara has lived, first in her family and then together with her husband Enrico, touches on the truth of human existence and its fundamental pillars, deeply shaken – the cardinal remarked -: What is the meaning of human love and of human life, from its beginning to its end? What is the special mission of the woman? What is marriage and how is it lived according to God’s plan?”. “By opening the diocesan phase of the process of her beatification and canonization today, let us hope that at the end of the canonical procedure she may become a model of holiness, approved by the Church, for all the Christian faithful, especially those who, in this young married woman and mother of three children, find encouragement and support in the service of conjugal love and life”, Card. De Donatis concluded.