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:''Not to be confused with María de la Soledad, Our Lady of Solitude.'' Maria Soledad Torres y Acosta, S.M. (11 October 1887 – 2 December 1826) was a Spanish Religious Sister who founded the Sisters, Servants of Mary, dedicated to nursing the sick and needy of the world. She is honored as a saint by the Roman Catholic Church. ==Life== She was born the second of the five children of Francisco Torres, a dairy worker, and Antonia Acosta in Madrid on 2 December 1826, and baptized Antonia Bibiana Manuela. Her parents ran a small business in their home near the Plaza de España. She was educated by the Daughters of Charity and often visited the sick in her neighborhood, performing small penances for the benefit of others.〔("Saint Maria Soledad", The Newman Connection )〕 She also helped at a free school for the poor run by the Daughters.〔(【引用サイトリンク】title=Vida de la Fundadora )〕 Around 1850, when she was in her mid-20s, Torres felt called to enter an enclosed religious order and applied to a nearby Dominican monastery for admission as a lay sister, but had to wait until there was room for her. In 1851, she heard of the efforts of Miguel Martínez y Sanz, a member of the Servite Third Order, the parish priest in Chamberí, then one of the poorer suburbs of Madrid, which was undergoing the transition from being a farming region to an industrial one, around which basic housing was cropping up for the wave of workers who flocked to the new factories. Martínez envisioned founding a group of seven women who would minister to the sick poor of his parish in their own homes, as they often could not afford hospitalization. Torres offered herself for this life, and, albeit at first reluctantly, Martínez accepted her as the seventh and final member of the community he wished to establish.〔(【引用サイトリンク】work=Catholic Online )〕 On 15 August of that year, the feast day of the Assumption of Mary, Torres and six companions committed their lives to this service as a religious community. At that time they took a religious habit and she took the religious name of Sister Maria Soledad.〔 In 1856, Martínez took with him six of the twelve Sisters then in the community to the missions in the Spanish colony of Fernando Pó, leaving Torres as superior of the community and the sole remaining member of the original community. The remaining Sisters, however, soon removed her from this office. This move left the community disorganized and the bishop threatened to dissolve it. After an examination by him, Torres was re-appointed as superior and, with the help of a new director, Gabino Sánchez, an Augustinian Recollect friar, they continued their work. At this time they named their community the Servants of Mary serving the Sick." The bishop gave his formal approval of their ministry and expanded their work to include the care of the young delinquents of Madrid. The dedication of the Sisters was brought to the attention of the public by their care of the sick during the cholera epidemic of 1865.〔 Torres faced many trials throughout her time of leadership of the congregation. She became the victim of slander and was again removed from her office, until Sánchez had her reinstated, after another investigation. While establishing a new community of the congregation in Valencia, she faced the liberalizing government which took control of the empire in the Revolution of 1868. At about this time, several of the Sisters left the community, but the Servants grew in number and, in 1875, began to serve in Havana, Cuba. The new institute received definitive papal approval in 1876. Torres had governed the community for 35 years when she died of pneumonia on 11 October 1887. At the time of her death there were 46 houses of the Servants of Mary in Europe and Latin America.〔 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Maria Soledad Torres y Acosta」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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