St. Frances Xavier Cabrini was born July 15, 1850, she died December 22, 1917, Chicago, Illinois, U.S.
Mother Cabrini was canonized July 7, 1946. A nun and founder of the Missionary Sisters of the Sacred Heart. She was the first United States citizen to be canonized as a saint in the Roman Catholic Church. She is venerated as the patron saint of immigrants, hospital administrators, missionaries, and impossible causes.
She founded the Missionary Sisters of the Sacred Heart in 1880, which served orphans and offered a day school. She planned to found a convent in China, but Pope Leo XIII directed her to “go west, not east,” and so, she sailed with a small group of sisters for the United States in 1889.
Their work in the United States was to be concentrated among Italian immigrants, whose communities were discriminated against and neglected—including by American Catholic clergy—because of anti-Italian and anti-immigrant attitudes that prevailed at the time. This journey was the first in a series that took her through the Americas and into Europe.
She became a naturalized citizen of the United States in 1909.
Although plagued by ill health most of the time, Mother Cabrini established 67 houses—one for each year of her life—in such cities as Buenos Aires, Paris, Madrid, and Rio de Janeiro. She also founded several schools, hospitals, and orphanages.
A national shrine devoted to Mother Cabrini is located in Chicago, the city where she died.