Maria Anna Rosa Caiani

In 1894, encouraged by mothers from Poggio a Caiano, Marianna began gathering poor children from the street to provide them with basic instruction and teach them the catechism. In November 1896, joined by her friend Maria Fiaschi, she rented two rooms to live in community and dedicate herself entirely to this popular school. Shortly after, Redenta Frati joined them, forming the first nucleus of the future congregation. To meet government educational requirements, the community welcomed a qualified teacher, Doralice Bizzaguti, in 1901. As the number of companions increased, Marianna drafted the first constitutions of the community, which were approved by the Bishop of Pistoia on December 7, 1901. On December 15, 1902, Marianna and her first five companions received the religious habit. She then took the name Sister Maria Margherita of the Sacred Heart (in honor of Saint Margaret Mary Alacoque). On October 17, 1905, the sisters pronounced their first vows, officially founding the Institute of the Minims of the Sacred Heart of Jesus, Franciscan Tertiaries (later becoming the Franciscan Minims of the Sacred Heart). The institute developed rapidly. In 1910, a first branch house was opened in Lastra a Signa to manage a nursery school. On October 17, 1915, during the first general chapter of the congregation, Mother Maria Margherita was elected Superior General for life. During the First World War (1915-1918), she placed her nuns and postulants at the disposal of the authorities to care for the wounded in several military hospitals in Tuscany. On April 25, 1921, a few months before her death, the congregation was officially aggregated to the Franciscan Order. At her death in August 1921, the institute had 13 houses in Italy and 124 nuns engaged in schools, orphanages, and hospitals.

After the death of Mother Maria Margherita Caiani on August 8, 1921, in Montughi (Florence), her reputation for holiness continued to grow. The informative process for her cause of beatification opened on August 8, 1952, and closed on November 13, 1957. The cause was officially introduced in Rome on December 15, 1981. On June 5, 1986, Pope John Paul II authorized the promulgation of the decree recognizing the heroic nature of her virtues, conferring upon her the title of Venerable. For her beatification, the Church examined the scientifically inexplicable healing of Alice Poli Mariti. In November 1946, this woman was hospitalized at the Tabarracci Hospital in Viareggio, suffering from terminal pulmonary tuberculosis. After invoking the intercession of Mother Maria Margherita Caiani, she was suddenly and completely healed during the night. This miracle was officially recognized by the Holy See, paving the way for her beatification.

Mother Maria Margherita Caiani was solemnly proclaimed blessed by Pope John Paul II on April 23, 1989, in Saint Peter's Square in Rome, in the presence of many faithful and her spiritual daughters. Her mortal remains are venerated today and rest in the chapel of the motherhouse of the Minims of the Sacred Heart, located on Via Giuliano da Sangallo in Poggio a Caiano.

The spirituality of Blessed Maria Margherita Caiani rests on two fundamental pillars: reparatory devotion to the Sacred Heart of Jesus and the spirit of littleness ("minime") inherited from Saint Francis of Assisi. She liked to repeat: "I must be dead while living: dead to myself, alive to help others live." For her, love of neighbor had to pass through the heart of God: "The source of my love for men, my brothers, passes only through the heart of God." Pope Francis, in a message addressed to the congregation in 2020, emphasized that the name "Minims" chosen by the foundress expresses a lifestyle marked by humility and simplicity, in the image of Christ who made himself small even to death on the cross. Today, the Franciscan Minims of the Sacred Heart continue the work of their foundress in Italy and throughout the world, notably in Egypt, the Holy Land (Bethlehem), Brazil, and Sri Lanka, dedicating themselves to the education of the young, assistance to the elderly and the sick, and works of mercy.