Her contemplative vocation

Her First Communion marked the beginning of the journey of vocation for Maria. During that event, something unusual happened that surprised the Parish Priest, Don Vicente Pastor. Addressing the little girls about to receive their First Communion, he asked them a clear question:

• ¿Would any one of you like to give yourself wholly to God to be his Bride?

A moment of hesitant silence followed, then a little hand went up and one of the girls, in a clear voice, replied:

• “I want to!”

The girl was Blessed Maria Guadalupe Ricart Olmos, who throughout her life gave herself entirely to God and was a courageous witness to his love. Years later, during the terrible persecution, she did not hesitate to declare her vocation to those who had come to take her prisoner, saying:

•  “I am a nun, and if I were to be born a thousand times over, I would still be on in Al Pie de la Cruz monastery!”

The firm conviction of belonging to God alone won her a cruel martyrdom. But for this she would have to prepare herself.

After her First Communion, the desire of Maria Guadalupe to dedicate herself entirely to God grew day by day. On her frequent visits to Al Pie de la Cruz monastery of the Servite Nuns in Valencia, where her mother had a great friend, she developed her vocation in the Church. With the permission of her mother and the support of the Parish Priest, she succeeded in entering the monastery when she was only fifteen years old. What a clear idea she had of the call of God was demonstrated by the religious maturity of this girl who was already giving signs of being a great woman and a fine Christian. While she was on her way with her mother to Valenica to enter the cloister, someone declared in a loud voice:

•  “They are taking that girl to the monastery by trickery!”

She, without losing her calm as she also would not at the moment of martyrdom, replied:

•  “I know very well what I am doing because it is Jesus who is calling me.”

And there is no doubt that day after  day she responded to Jesus  with the poor, virginal, hidden life of the cloister right up to the consummation of her self-donation in her martyrdom.