Bl. María Romero Meneses

María Romero Meneses was born in Granada, Nicaragua, in 1902, one of eight children in a well-off family. She studied painting, piano and violin. At twelve she spent six months paralysed by rheumatic fever. She credited her recovery to Mary, Help of Christians, and decided to become a Salesian sister.

From 1931 she worked in San José, Costa Rica. Starting with catechism classes and job training for poor girls, she went on to found a medical clinic, a school and seven small villages of homes for poor families. Costa Ricans called her a social apostle. She died in Nicaragua in 1977 and was beatified in 2002.

María Romero Meneses was beatified in 1988.

Beatification allows public veneration, usually in a particular region or religious family. Canonization extends it to the whole Church.