Isola del Gran Sasso d'Italia, Italy

The A24 motorway from Rome to Teramo has an exit named after a saint. It reads San Gabriele–Colledara, and the road from it runs some three kilometres into a valley where the Mavone and the Ruzzo meet under the grey wall of the Gran Sasso d'Italia, the highest massif of the Apennines. percorsokm+1

At Isola del Gran Sasso d'Italia two churches stand side by side at the foot of that rock: a basilica raised in 1908, and beside it the much larger church opened in 1970 for the crowds the first could not hold. In the crypt of the older church lies the body of Gabriele dell'Addolorata — Gabriel of Our Lady of Sorrows — a Passionist student who died in the convent behind it on 27 February 1862, at twenty-three, before he could be ordained. gran sasso national park+1

Pilgrims come up the valley to him in great numbers, and the shrine is counted among the fifteen most visited in the world. They come young: schoolchildren a hundred days before their state examinations, and the tent city pitched on the meadow below the churches in the last week of August. The comune holds two older places of prayer as well — the hermitage of St. Colomba high on the mountain above the hamlet of Pretara, and, on a knoll by the Mavone outside the town, the austere Romanesque-Gothic church of San Giovanni ad Insulam. san gabriele sanctuary+1

📜 History & Spiritual Significance

Francesco Possenti was born in Assisi on 1 March 1838, the eleventh of thirteen children of a governor of the Papal States, and baptised in the font of the cathedral of San Rufino where St. Francis had been baptised. The family moved to Spoleto, where his mother died and where he grew up well liked and fashionable, a dancer at the receptions of the town — his friends called him il damerino, the little gentleman. Two serious illnesses drew promises of religious life from him; both lapsed. On 22 August 1856, in the procession of the octave of the Assumption, as the ancient icon of the Madonna of Spoleto passed, he heard in his heart the words he repeated afterwards: "Checchino, il mondo non è per te! Presto, fatti religioso!" — Checchino, the world is not for you; be quick, become a religious. san gabriele sanctuary+1

Two weeks later he entered the Passionist novitiate at Morrovalle and took the name Gabriele dell'Addolorata, Gabriel of Our Lady of Sorrows, after the image of the Pietà his mother had kept. He was sent to Isola in 1859 to read theology away from the wars of the Risorgimento, and wrote to his father that the place was amenissimo, most pleasant, having the air of the mountain and of the sea together. Brothers who followed him out of curiosity found him kneeling on sharp stones by the stream below the convent, at prayer and seeming to feel nothing of them. He received minor orders in the cathedral of Penne in 1861, with tuberculosis already in him, and died at dawn on 27 February holding an image of Our Lady of Sorrows. wikipedia+3

Four years after his burial the Kingdom of Italy suppressed the religious orders and the Passionists left Isola; the church that held the grave stood untended for some thirty years. When the remains were examined in 1892 for the opening of his cause, the people of the town surrounded the church to prevent them being carried off to Spoleto, and the body stayed where it lies. The Passionists returned, the basilica over the crypt was built for his beatification, and Benedict XV canonised him in 1920. He is patron of Italian Catholic youth, and John XXIII named him patron of Abruzzo in 1959. wikipedia+2

What draws the young is the smallness of the life. He founded nothing and preached nothing — he died before ordination — and the Passionists hold him up for the fidelity with which he kept an ordinary rule; the shrine calls him the saint of the smile. In the crypt he is carved as a young religious asleep, a crucifix on his breast and a lily in his right hand, and pilgrims pray at the urn and leave their intentions there. Companies of pilgrims walk to the shrine from the towns of Abruzzo and the Marche, at night along the paths and the minor roads, with a repertoire of pilgrim songs of their own. san gabriele sanctuary+2

☩ Pilgrimage Sites in Isola del Gran Sasso d'Italia

Shrine of St. Gabriel of Our Lady of Sorrows

Santuario di San Gabriele dell'Addolorata

The older basilica, raised for the beatification and fronted by a three-arched loggia, stands at the foot of the mountain; its neo-Gothic crypt holds the urn with the saint's body. The newer church beside it takes the great feast-day congregations, with room for some six thousand people. In the convent behind, the cameretta del transito — the room where he died — is kept as it was, and the museum of ex-votos shows what pilgrims have brought and left. Mass and confession times are on the shrine's own website. gran sasso national park+1

Address Via del Santuario 187, 64045 Isola del Gran Sasso d'Italia TE, Italy GPS 42.516862, 13.657267 Map Google Maps Web sangabriele.org

Hermitage of St. Colomba

Eremo di Santa Colomba

A chapel at 1,234 metres under Monte Infornace, where St. Colomba, a noblewoman of the Pagliara family and sister of St. Berardo, bishop of Teramo, withdrew to live and to die in the twelfth century. Her relics were carried down from the mountain and are kept in the valley below. Pilgrims climb to the hermitage on 1 September, lay their hands on the rock that bears the print of hers, and rest their heads in the hollow beside it against headache. The way up is on foot only: a marked trail from Piano del Fiume above Pretara, about an hour's climb and some 400 metres of ascent, walkable between May and November. isola del gran sasso+3

Address Pretara, 64045 Isola del Gran Sasso d'Italia TE, Italy GPS 42.463108, 13.661362 Map Google Maps Web comune.isola.te.it

🕯️ Annual Feast Days & Celebrations

St. Gabriel of Our Lady of Sorrows — 27 February

The day of his death, and his feast in the Church's calendar. The shrine keeps it as its principal feast; in the traditional calendar it falls on 28 February in a leap year.

The Pilgrims' Feast — second Saturday of July

The shrine's summer feast, kept for the pilgrimage made in warm weather.

The Youth Tendopoli — late August

Young people camp for several days on the meadow below the churches, with Mass, talks, prayer and testimonies, closing with the Festa dei Giovani on the last Sunday of the month.

The Hundred Days — March

A hundred days before the state school-leaving examinations, students from Abruzzo and the regions around it come to the tomb to pray for their work, and outside the church their pens are blessed.

Feast of St. Colomba — 1 September

The pilgrimage on foot up to the hermitage above Pretara for the feast of the comune's own hermit saint.

🚗 Getting There

By Air: Pescara International (PSR) is the nearest airport, some 45 km east. Rome's Fiumicino and Ciampino lie further out but carry far more flights, and the A24 motorway runs from Rome into the valley.

By Train: There is no station in the town. The nearest are Teramo, 18 km away, and Roseto degli Abruzzi on the Adriatic, 35 km; local buses run on from both.

By Car: The A24 Rome–L'Aquila–Teramo has its own exit for the shrine, San Gabriele–Colledara, about 3 km from the town. The next exit, Basciano–Villa Vomano, is 13 km out.

📚 Further Reading

Online Resources:

Shrine of St. Gabriel: Biography — The Passionists' own account of the saint's life, from Assisi to the convent infirmary at Isola (Italian).

Passionist Historical Archives: St. Gabriel Possenti — The congregation's archivists on the sources for his life, and on the stories told about him without foundation.

Vatican News: San Gabriele dell'Addolorata — Short life for the saint of 27 February (Italian).

The Young Saint of the Gran Sasso — The national park's heritage study of the pilgrimage to the shrine, its foot pilgrimages and its votive customs.

🔗 Useful Links

Shrine of St. Gabriel — Official site of the sanctuary, with Mass and confession times.

Comune di Isola del Gran Sasso d'Italia — The town's official site, with its churches and its hamlets.

Gran Sasso e Monti della Laga National Park — The park the town and the hermitage trail lie inside.

Passionists — The congregation St. Gabriel belonged to.

🧭 Nearby Pilgrimage Destinations

L'Aquila (28 km) — Collemaggio, where Pietro da Morrone was crowned Celestine V and where his Perdonanza is kept.

Manoppello (45 km) — The Holy Face of Jesus, held to be Veronica's veil.

Ortona (64 km) — The relics of St. Thomas the Apostle, in the basilica on the Adriatic.

Assisi (106 km) — The birthplace of St. Francis and St. Clare, and of Gabriel Possenti, baptised in the font of San Rufino.

🪶 Closing Reflection

In his first weeks in the novitiate the young man who had been the dancer of Spoleto wrote home to his father.

"My life is a continual joy; I would not trade a quarter of an hour of it for a year, or for as long as you like, of the shows and amusements of the world."

— St. Gabriel of Our Lady of Sorrows, letter to his father Sante, 23 October 1856