Ordinary Saints Wear Capes

Celebrating Cabrini

The film Cabrini, 2024 from Angel Studios, starring Christiana Dell’Anna and directed by Alejandro Monteverde appropriately launched in theaters nationwide for International Women’s Day. Based on the true story of Frances Xavier Cabrini, an Italian missionary who came to New York in 1889 to serve Italian immigrants, Cabrini is alive with hope that the kingdom of God has come to earth in the lives of ordinary saints living out extraordinary adventures of love.

In the last scene, the mayor of New York tells Mother Cabrini:

“It’s a shame that you’re a woman because you would have made an excellent man,” to which Mother Cabrini’s reply stuns: “No man can do what we do.”

Yes, her ambition is real, and her tenacity against all earthly powers is the foundation for building her “empire of hope.” Yet her zealous mission was not for personal power as the mission statement for her Missionary Sisters of the Sacred heart explains:

I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me.
St. Paul, Philippians 4:13

Mother Cabrini’s suffering and weakness opens the way for God’s strength to be revealed. Weakened by a childhood near-drowning incident, she purposely lived each year to the fullest through the grace of the Lord who says:

“My grace is sufficient for you, for power is made perfect in weakness.” As she fights injustice, poverty, and racism, Cabrini would most likely say as Paul “I am content with weaknesses, insults, hardships, persecutions, and constraints, for the sake of Christ; for when I am weak, then I am strong.”
2 Corinthians 12

This film is not a political statement about immigration, but about the humanity of the immigrant, the poor, and the prostitute and the ordinary sainthood of those who stand with them in the streets and brothels, and stand for them in places of power and change.

Throughout the film, Mother Cabrini wears an austere black habit and dress. When things got really tough in fighting the hostile mayor and citizens of New York for her cause against immigrant discrimination, she puts on a black cape, carefully wrapping it around her with the power of justice and mercy, symbolizing her steadfast zeal for the Lord and her people.

Frances Xavier Cabrini founded a total of 67 institutions worldwide, including schools, orphanages, hospitals, and social service outreach programs. On July 7, 1946, Pope Pius XII declared her a saint, and on September 8, 1950, she was named the Patron Saint to Immigrants. The film Cabrini focuses on her mission to empower immigrants, orphans, and the poor, through education, access to equal services, and inclusive community building. A hero for our times, an ordinary saint wrapped in a cape, her cloak of zeal.