Giulia Gabrieli

Giulia Maria Gabrieli was born on 3 March 1997 in Bergamo, Italy, daughter of Antonio Gabrieli and Sara Lecchi. Giulia, like her younger brother Davide, was a normal girl, simple and sunny, deeply Catholic. Among her passions were writing and dancing. In August 2009, while she was on vacation at the beach with her family, Giulia noticed a swelling on her left hand. Initially, the parents considered the cause to be a simple insect bite; then, realizing that this symptom did not regress, Giulia underwent a series of tests. The diagnosis turned out to be one of the most aggressive sarcomas. Giulia required chemotherapy. Although the illness made her very weak, Giulia continued to go to school, preparing and brilliantly passing the third-grade exams, the oral exams she had to take at home. Giulia had a particular talent for writing. She wrote about her experience of her disease which was then collected and published in the book entitled A hook in the middle of the sky.

During her earthly journey, Giulia came across the figure of Chiara Badano who represented an example for her to follow, so that her illness did not distance her from the Lord but rather brought her closer to Him. However, there was a moment of crisis in which she wondered if God had abandoned her. While in Padua for radiotherapy, she went to the Basilica of St. Anthony where, thanks to the fortuitous encounter with a woman in prayer, she rediscovered the joy of facing her ordeal knowing that God would never abandon her.

Her joy was contagious, incredible given her condition: she was the one who consoled and supported relatives and friends, even astonishing the doctors who assisted her, and she jokingly called them, "her superheroes". After her first trip to Medjugorje, she intensified her bond with Our Lady, so much so that for her fourteenth birthday she asked for a second trip as a gift. Thus, she went, accompanied by fifty relatives and friends.

Giulia died in Bergamo on the evening of August 19, 2011, while the Way of the Cross by young people was underway at World Youth Day in Madrid. Today Giulia rests in the Monumental Cemetery of Bergamo. On April 7, 2019, Giulia was proclaimed "Servant of God".