October 22, 2017

Take My Hand, Not My Life

Dr. Gianna Emanuela Molla (the daughter of St. Gianna) will share her perspectives on living moments of grace at life’s end at a Symposium on Saturday, October 28th in St. Paul.  The event begins with an  8am Mass with Bishop Cozzens at St. Mary’s Chapel, St. Paul Seminary, with a continental breakfast and the symposium in Woulfe Alumni Hall at the University of St. Thomas from 8:45-11:30am.  To register online, www.giannahomes.org/2017symposium, or 952.443.6100.

An Italian medical doctor, St. Gianna experienced pregnancy complications with her fourth child in 1961 and had been advised by her doctor to have an abortion, since the pregnancy threatened her life. She decided to continue the pregnancy and risk her own life for the child. She died in 1962 a week after giving birth to a daughter, Gianna Emanuela.

St. John Paul II canonized St. Gianna in 2004 for her heroism in that decision and her holy life. After her father’s death in 2010, the daughter, Dr. Gianna Emanuela Molla, a geriatric doctor who had stepped away from her profession to care for her father, began speaking around the world about her saintly mother.

She will be the keynote speaker at an Oct. 27 Gala supporting the Minnetonka-based memory care residences Gianna Homes, which was named for her mother. She will also be the keynote speaker the following day at “Take My Hand, Not My Life, “ a symposium on end-of-life issues.

The symposium is being organized in collaboration with the Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis, Minnesota Catholic Conference, Curatio, Catholic Medical Association and the Order of Malta’s Minnesota Delegation