St. Alfonso Maria Fusco
Feast Day: February 6
Alfonso Maria Fusco, the oldest of five children, was born on March 23, 1839, in Angri, in the Province of Salerno, in the Diocese of Nocera-Sarno, Italy. His parents, Aniello Fusco and Josephine Schiavone, were both of peasant stock but were raised from their infancy with strong Christian principles and with the fear of God.
They were married in the Collegiata of St. John the Baptist on January 31, 1834, and for four long years the cradle they had lovingly prepared remained painfully empty. In Pagani, only a short distance from Angri, the relics of St. Alfonso Maria de’ Liguori were preserved. It was to his tomb that Aniello and Josephine went in 1838 to pray. While they were there, the Redemptorist Francesco Saverio Pecorelli told them: “You will have a son; you will name him Alfonso; he will become a Priest and will live the life of Blessed Alfonso”.
The little boy quickly revealed a mild, gentle, lovable character, responsive to prayer and to the poor. His teachers in his father’s house were learned and holy Priests who instructed him and prepared him for his first meeting with Jesus. When he was seven, he received his First Holy Communion and Confirmation.
He told his parents when he was eleven that he wanted to become a Priest, and on November 5, 1850, “freely and with the sole desire to serve God and the Church”, as he himself declared many years later, he entered the Episcopal Seminary of Nocera dei Pagani. On May 29, 1863, he was ordained by the Archbishop of Salerno, Monsignor Anthony Salomone, amid the joy of his family and the enthusiasm of the people.
Quickly he distinguished himself among the Clergy of the Collegiata of St. John the Baptist in Angri for his zeal, his regular attendance at liturgical services and for his diligence in the administration of the Sacraments, especially the Sacrament of Reconciliation where he revealed his paternal understanding of his penitents. He devoted himself to the evangelisation of the people through his simple and incisive style of preaching.
The daily life of Fr. Alfonso was that of a zealous Priest, but he carried in his heart an old dream. In his last years at the Seminary, one night he dreamt that Jesus the Nazarene was calling him to found an Institute of Sisters and an orphanage for boys and girls as soon as he was ordained.
It was a meeting with Maddalena Caputo of Angri, a strong-willed woman aspiring to enter Religious Life, which impelled Fr. Alfonso to move more quickly in the foundation of the Institute. On September 25, 1878, Miss Caputo and three other young women met at night in the dilapidated Scarcella house in the Ardinghi District of Angri. The young women wanted to dedicate themselves to their own sanctification through a life of poverty, of union with God, and of charity in the care and instruction of poor orphans.
The Congregation of the Baptistine Sisters of the Nazarene was thus begun; the seed had fallen into the good earth of the hearts of these four zealous and generous women. Privations, struggles, opposition, and trials were their lot, and the Lord made that seed grow abundantly. The Scarcella House was quickly named the Little House of Providence.
The unjustified attempt by the Diocesan Bishop Saverio Vitagliano to remove Fr. Alfonso as Director of the Institute based on false accusations; the refusal by his own daughters to open the door for him of the House on Via Germanico in Rome because of their desire for a division were for him moments of great suffering. He was seen praying in anguish, like Jesus in the Garden, in the small Chapel in the Mother House in Angri and in the Church of St. Joachim in Rome.
Fr. Alfonso had great love for the Eucharist, passion of Jesus and a filial devotion to the Sorrowful Mother. He directed the Institute wisely and prudently. Like a loving father, he watched over the Sisters and the orphans. He showed an almost maternal tenderness for all, especially for the most needy of the orphans.
At a time when education was the privilege of the few, denied to the poor and to women, Father Alfonso sacrificed to give the children a peaceful life, an education and a trade for the older ones so that they could live as honest citizens and as committed Christians.
During the night of February 5, 1910, he felt unwell. He requested and received the Sacraments on the morning of February 6 and after having blessed his daughters with trembling hands, he slept peacefully in the Lord.
He was proclaimed blessed on October 7, 2001 by Pope John Paul II, and is offered as an example to Priests as a protector especially of the poor and the needy.
