Life of Blessed Nemesia (Giulia) Valle of the Sisters of Charity of Saint Joan Antida Thouret.

1. Blessed Nemesia Valle
Sister of Charity of St. Joan Antida

2. Early years
Giulia Valle was born at Aosta, a
bilingual region in the Italian Alps, on
June 26, 1847, to a young and well-
to-do couple who had already
prematurely lost two sons.
She had a younger brother Vincenzo.
Her mother Maria Cristina worked as
a milliner and her father Anselm was
a traveling business man.
Animated with a profound religious
sense, Maria Cristina inspired the
two children with an authentic
openness towards others, and a
generous character; a serene life,
which grounded the lively and
naturally curious little Giulia.
Aosta: basilica S.Orso

3. Baptismal font of
Bl. Nemesia

4. Early years
In 1850, her father’s business was
transferred to France, at Besançon
and he decided to take the whole
family with him. Sadly, their stay in
France was traumatically interrupted
by the premature death of his wife
Maria Cristina, when Giulia was only
5 years old. Together with her brother
Vincenzo, she was entrusted to her
paternal grandfather and to an
unmarried aunt, in a very austere
environment, where the two children
experienced all the sadness of being
orphans.
When Giulia was 11, she was sent to
a boarding school run by the Sisters
of Charity. There she learned French
very well, became very adept at
playing the piano, embroidery and
drawing. She also began to study the
texts of the great masters of catholic
spirituality, St. Vincent de Paul and
St. Francis de Sales.

5. After she completed her studies, Giulia’s
father re-married and moved to Pont-Saint-
Martin. Giulia had a difficult relationship
with his new wife and once again found
herself in an environment deprived of
understanding. Her brother Vincenzo ran
away, because of continual disagreements
with the stepmother, and Giulia would never
know where her beloved brother had gone.
She faced this difficult time of her life by
seeking comfort from her mother’s family,
whom she constantly visited: with them she
could revisit her childhood memories, and
the happy years spent with her mother.
Perhaps for the very same reason, Giulia
rediscovered the Sisters of Charity, her old
teachers from Besançon who had
encouraged and supported her. They had a
house at Pont-Saint-Martin, and she
became attracted to their charitable
style. Giulia often visited the small
community of sisters dedicated to the
education of children, and soon began to
help the sisters with teaching
catechism, embroidery, and the supervision
of the little ones during recreation time.

6. When the time had come for Giulia to
think about her future, she decided to
choose religious life. Her father Anselm
was surprised at his daughter’s decision
and tried to dissuade her, but ended up
giving his consent, and on September 8,
1866 he accompanied her to Vercelli, to
the Monastery Santa Margherita, where
the Sisters of Charity had a novitiate. For
Giulia it was a birth to a new life, in peace
and in joy even if in the midst of tears
because of the new environment and
being away from friends and family.
At the end of her novitiate, Giulia received
the religious habit and a new name: Sister
Nemesia. Nemesio was a martyr of the
first centuries of Christianity. She was
happy with the name, and it would
become her life’s motto: “To witness my
love for Jesus, to the end, always,
whatever the cost.”

7. Her mission began at Tortona, in the
Institute San Vincenzo, an Elementary and
Secondary School, boarding school, and
orphanage. Sister Nemesia quickly became
the authority for every project, whether
apostolic or formational. She was involved
with teaching and participated hands-on in
the various initiatives, with an open heart
and open arms, even when the work was not
so inviting, wherever someone who was
suffering needed to be consoled, wherever
discomfort, fatigue, and poverty limited
someone’s quality of life, wherever there
were new paths to follow for educational
and catechetical reform.
The unanimous refrain in and outside her
house was: “Oh, Sister Nemesia’s heart!”
Pupils, families, orphans, the poor,
seminarians, even the neighboring soldiers
all approached her: for a letter, to ask to
darn their clothes, to help them overcome
their home sickness. All of them were
convinced that they had a special place in
her heart, even more so after she was
named Superior, which she accepted only to
be able to render better service.

8. She had many commitments, including being the
bookkeeper for the Institute, which was constantly in the
red; but if someone needed to speak to her, she took
time to listen attentively, as if that were the only thing on
her mind. Frictions with the sisters would arise, but she
remained surprisingly calm.
She was always knitting to provide clothes for the
orphans, for the Seminarians for whom she had a soft
spot and also for the soldiers stationed in the nearby
military district. One generation after the other, all of
them wanted to remain in touch with Sr. Nemesia— they
would came back to the college to introduce their
fiancé, or to present their newborn child.
Although there was never enough money, she was very
supportive of the missions. When the spiritual Director
for the Institute, Fr. Giuseppe Carbone, left for Eritrea
she supported him with many initiatives, collecting
money to help him with his mission. She also helped as
best she could the young Fr. Luigi Orione, founder of the
Sons of the Divine Providence, and Blessed Teresa Grillo
Michel, foundress of the Little Sisters of Divine
Providence in Alessandria. She established a strong and
fruitful collaboration with them; they shared a common
spirituality and charity.

9. On May 10, 1903, Sr. Nemesia left Tortona
for Borgaro Torinese, a small country town,
where the generalate of the Sisters of
Charity was starting a novitiate in the new
province of Turin. The novices there were
waiting for a leader to accompany them
along their new journey, long and austere
but filled with joy because they were giving
themselves to God and to the poor,
according to Saint Jeanne Antide Thouret’s
spirit.
In Borgaro, Sr. Nemesia was very active,
together with her collaborators: those who
worked in the house, the garden, the
orchard and above all with the youth. Her
method of formation always aimed at
teaching kindness and understanding,
renouncing everything in order to love,
having patience, and knowing how to find
the right and necessary path for each novice
in particular. Her novices tell us: “She knew
each one of us individually, understood our
needs, she treated each one of us according
to our character and she used to ask us to
find ways to love one another.”
Small statue of the Virgin
belonging to Sr. Nemesia
Park at Borgaro

10. Over a span of thirteen years, five hundred
novices learned trust in God, love of prayer,
dedication to serving the poor, and the
evangelical meaning of the community. Her
sanctity was expressed and lived day by
day: “Sanctity does not consist in doing
many things or in doing great things but in
doing whatever God asks us to do, and to do
it with patience, love and above all in fidelity
as is our duty, fruit of a great love.” “Holy is
the person who consumes herself in her
place every day, for the Lord. Given love is
the only thing that remains: see that you love
intensively before you reach your life’s end.”
But the Provincial Superior clearly did not
approve of her approach and believed that a
more rigid method would better form the
future religious. Sr. Nemesia was scolded
and humiliated, even in public. She accepted
everything in silence and quietly continued
her mission: “From one station to the other
let us continue our path along the desert…
and if the desert is deaf, He who created us
is always listening...”

11. The years at Borgaro Torinese, were a real
season of trial for Sr. Nemesia, because of
the difficulties and misunderstandings.
Although extremely balanced and serene in
her interior life and in the way she formed the
novices, she suffered. The Provincial
Superior continues to disapprove of her, the
sisters of her community accuse her of
weakness, to the point where persisting
difficulties and misunderstandings start to
deteriorate her health, and in the autumn of
1916 she suddenly broke down.
Struck with a sudden attack of pneumonia,
she died after six days in agony, on
December 18, 1916.
Beatification at St. Peter’s Basilica, 2004

12. The prayer she recited from very early on:
“Jesus strip me of myself, and dress me with Yourself,”
accompanied her throughout her life.
Finally she could say: “I do not exist anymore for anyone.”
The detachment of self was total.
It was the extreme offering of a life totally given to Love.

13. Source:
Based on her biography at
suoredellacarita.org
Photo: Associated Press