The origin of Saint Rita’s Shrine is intimately tied both to the story of Italian immigration to the United States and to popular religious devotion at the beginning of the 20th Century.

In the year 1907 the Augustinian Friars from Villanova, one of the suburbs surrounding the City of Philadelphia, were asked to found a parish to assist in the care of the tens of thousands of Italian families coming into the city. When they did, they chose Saint Rita as the patron of the new foundation - a wise and providential choice, not only because Rita herself was a daughter of Italian soil, but also because her canonization just a few years earlier in 1900, was quickly bringing her to the attention of people far and wide as a sympathetic and attractive model of holiness and a powerful intercessor in the most needy of cases. The friars soon established a novena to Saint Rita, conducted 13 times each Sunday and Wednesday to accommodate the thousands of people who flocked to the basement church each week to seek favors or to give thanks for graces received.

In 1915 the magnificent upper church was completed and has continued to operate both as a parish church and as the center of devotion to the Saint of Cascia in the United States. Today, several generations after the original immigrants have gone, the parish population is very small, but devotion to Saint Rita continues strong among people near and far.

Home | History of the Shrine | Saint Rita of Cascia | Renovation Campaign | Donations

Directions to the Shrine | Shrine Services | E-mail Prayer Requests | Virtual Tour