Saint Rafqa Pietra Choboq Ar-Rayès

23rd March

Today is the Feast of Saint Rafqa Pietra Choboq Ar-Rayès (1832 - 1914), a Lebanese Maronite religious sister, who is greatly revered in that country. I was very privileged to visit her Shrine last year where the soil near her original place of burial is associated with miraculous cures. This is a good animated summary of her life from Saint Rafqa

The following is largely taken from the Holy See website https://www.vatican.va/news_services/liturgy/saints/ns_lit_doc_20010610_rafqa-choboq_en.html

Saint Rafqa was born in Himlaya, one of the villages of Northern Metn, Lebanon, on 29 June, 1832. She was the only child of Mourad Saber el-Choboq el Rayess and Rafqa Gemayel. On 7 July, 1832 she was baptised and named Boutroussieh. Her parents taught her the love of God and the practice of daily prayer. At age seven, she suffered her first great loss with the death of her mother.

In 1843, her father experienced financial difficulties and sent her into service for four years in the home of Assaad Badawi. Rafqa grew into a beautiful, pleasant, and humorous young woman, pure and tender with a serene voice.

In 1841, she returned home to find that her father had remarried. His new wife wanted Rafqa to marry her brother. Conflict developed when her aunt sought to arrange a marriage between her son and Rafqa.

At this time, Rafqa felt drawn to the religious life. She asked God to help her achieve her desire and set off for the convent of Our Lady of Deliverance in Bikfaya, accompanied by two girls whom she met along the road. When she entered the convent church, she felt deep joy and happiness. One look at the icon of Our Lady of Deliverance, and she heard God's voice confirming her desire to enter religious life.

Following a year of postulancy, Rafqa received the habit of her congregation on the feast of St. Joseph, 1861. A year later, she pronounced her first vows. The new nun, along with sister Mary Gemayel, was assigned to work in the Jesuit-run seminary in Ghazir. Among the seminarians were Elias Houwayek and Boutros el-Zoghbi, later to become Partriarch and Archbishop, respectively.

Rafqa was in charge of kitchen service. In her free time she studied Arabic, calligraphy and mathematics and also helped to educate girls aspiring to join her congregation. In 1860 Rafqa was sent to Deir el-Kamar to teach catechism. There she witnessed the bloody clashes that occurred in Lebanon during this period. On one occasion, she risked her own life by hiding a child under her robe and saving him from death.

After a year in Deir el-Kamar, Rafqa returned to Ghazir. In 1862, she was sent to teach in a school of her order in Byblos. One year later, she was transferred to Maad village. There, with another nun, she spent seven years establishing a new school for girls, made possible through the generosity of Antoun Issa.

While living in Maad, and following a crisis in her congregation, Rafqa sought divine guidance. Entering at St. George's Church, she prayed for help. Once again, she heard the Lord's voice confirming her call to religious life. Soon after, she dreamt that St. George, St. Simon and St. Anthony the Great, the father of monasticism, were telling her to enter the Lebanese Maronite Order.

Her trip from Maad to the Maronite Monastery of St. Simon el-Qarn in Aito was facilitated by the generosity of Mr. Antoun Issa. She was immediately admitted to the Order, receiving the habit on 12 July 1871 and pronouncing her vows on 25 August, 1872. She received the name, sister Rafqa, after her mother.

She was to spend the next 26 years in the monastery of St. Simon. In her observation of the rule, her devotion to prayer and silence, in her life of sacrifice and austerity, she was a role model to the other nuns.

In October 1885 Rafqa decided not to join the nuns for a walk around the monastery. In her autobiographical account she wrote;

“It was the first Sunday of the Rosary. I did not accompany them. Before leaving each of the nuns came and said to me, ‘Pray for me sister.’ There were some who asked me to say seven decades of the Rosary … I went to the Church and started to pray. Seeing that I was in good health and that I had never been sick in my life, I prayed to God in this way, ‘Why, O my God, have you distanced yourself from me and have abandoned me. You have never visited me with sickness! Have you perhaps abandoned me?’”

Rafqa continued in her account to her superior, the next night after the prayer;

“At the moment of sleeping I felt a most violent pain spreading above my eyes to the point that I reached the state you see me in, blind and paralysed and as I myself had asked for sickness I could not allow myself to complain or murmur.”

Her superior insisted that she undergo medical treatment. After all local attempts to cure her had failed, she was sent to Beirut for treatment. Passing by St. John-Mark's Church in Byblos, her companions learned that an American doctor was traveling in the area. Contacted, he agreed to perform surgery on the afflicted eye. St. Rafqa refused anesthesia. In the course of the surgery, her eye became completely detached. Within a short time, the disease struck the left eye.

For the next 12 years she continued to experience intense pain in her head. Throughout this period, as before, she remained patient and uncomplaining, praying in thanksgiving for the gift of sharing in Jesus' suffering.

When the Lebanese Maronite Order decided to build the monastery of St. Joseph al Dahr in Jrabta, Batroun, in 1897, six nuns, led by Mother Ursula Doumit, were sent to the new monastery. Rafqa was among them.

In 1899, she lost the sight in her left eye. With this a new stage of her suffering began, intensified by the dislocation of her clavicle and her right hip and leg. Her vertebrae were visible through her skin. Her face was spared and remained shining to the end. Her hands stayed intact; and she used them to knit socks and make clothing. She thanked God for the use of her hands while also thanking Him for permitting her a share in His Son's suffering.

Rafqa was 82 years old when she died. She had lived 29 years in suffering. On 23 March, 1914, after receiving the Blessed Sacrament, and calling upon Jesus, the Virgin Mary and St. Joseph, she rested in peace after a life of prayer, service and years of unbearable pain. She was buried in the monastery's cemetery. A splendid light appeared on her grave for three consecutive nights. With the intercession of Saint Rafqa, Our Lord performed many miracles and blessings.

On 10 July, 1927, her body was transferred to a shrine in the corner of the monastery chapel. The case for her beatification was introduced on 23 December, 1925, and canonical investigation of her life began on May 16, 1926. Pope John Paul II declared her: Venerable in 1982, and she was Beatified in1985. She was declared a role model in the adoration of the Eucharist during the Jubilee Year 2000, and Canonised the following year.

These relatively recent Maronite Saints are really quite incredible! Saint Rafqa, pray for us!