On June 21, 1866 in Atotonilco el Alto, Jalisco, Mexico, Maria Luisa de la Peña was the first surviving of 14 children born to Don Epigmenio de la Peña and Maria Luisa Navarro, who as ranch owners, were among the wealthier residents of the town.  The baby girl was delicate and of fragile health, but nonetheless she clung to life.  Because of her frailty, she was quickly taken to the parish church to be baptized, and was given the name “Maria Luisa” in honor of both St. Aloysius Gonzaga on whose feast day she was born, and her mother, who shared the same name and birthday.

From an early age, Maria Luisa felt drawn to the religious life; however, at the age of 15, in obedience to her parents’ wishes, therein seeing God’s will for her, she married Doctor Pascual Rojas, a prominent physician, twice her age. Their marriage took place on February 9, 1882.

Their life together was happy and a mutual growing in love of God and neighbor.  Once settled in their own home in Atotonilco, Maria Luisa spent much of her time in caring for the poor and nursing the sick.  So impressed was he by his wife’s example, Pasqual did everything he could to assist her in her charity.

Their one sorrow was that God did not grant them children.  However, the couple accepted God’s will, remaining steadfast in their trust in Him, and together decided that the poor would be their children.  They built a hospital, established solely on a charitable basis, to serve those less fortunate.  The little Hospital of the Sacred Heart was dedicated in January 1892.  After 14 years of married life, Maria Luisa was left a widow at age 29.  On his deathbed, Pasqual told her he had no doubt what she would do after his death – she would serve God as a religious.

In 1904, eight years following the death of Doctor Rojas, Maria Luisa entered the monastery of the Discalced Carmelites of St. Teresa in Guadalajara immersing herself in the spirituality of Carmel. After only seven months in religious life, Maria Luisa was asked by the archbishop to return to her work at the hospital, which was sorely in need of her administrative skills.  She trusted in God’s providence, returning to once again take up her former work at the hospital.  During this time, in addition to managing the hospital, she also established a school and orphanage.  As her work became more widely known, many others were attracted by her charism and were inspired to join in her work.

After just three years, twenty young women had joined Maria Luisa dedicated to nursing the sick and helping the poor.  Although grateful for the tremendous work these laywomen were doing, the archbishop was nonetheless concerned that they were attempting to live as a religious community with no rule and having no religious habit.  The archbishop told Maria Luisa that if she and her group of laywomen wanted to live as religious, they should become religious.  To that end, he told her to give up the hospital, school and orphanage and to affiliate her group with some religious community.  He suggested the Sisters of Perpetual Adoration in Guadalajara.  In obedience to the archbishop, Maria Luisa began to make arrangements for her twenty companions and herself to go to Guadalajara.  However, before all matters could be settled and finalized, the archbishop died. Maria Luisa would await the appointment of a new archbishop, who might have different thoughts on the matter.  As it turned out, the new archbishop, Francisco Orozco y Jimenez, was in complete accord with the thinking of his predecessor, the one exception being that he advised the young women to join the Servants of the Blessed Sacrament, rather than the Sisters of Perpetual Adoration.  So it was in obedience Maria Luisa and her twenty companions left their work behind and joined the Sister Servants of the Blessed Sacrament.

Four years later, the archbishop paid Maria Luisa (now a professed religious) a visit to tell her that the hospital had fallen into an even worse state than when she had returned from the Carmelite monastery, and that the school had closed.  He requested Maria Luisa to again resume managing the hospital and orphanage and to re-open the school.  Again, without hesitation or question, she obeyed.  Of the twenty women who had entered the convent of the Servants of the Blessed Sacrament with Maria Luisa, and who were given the opportunity to return with her into the world, only five chose to leave.

To make matters even more difficult, she was very poor in worldly goods.  All of Maria Luisa’s funds were gone, having been expended as the dowry for herself and her companions when they entered the convent.  Regardless, Maria Luisa focused on the task at hand, completely confident that God would provide the means with which she would accomplish the work He was calling her to do.

It wasn’t long upon returning to Atotonilco, that Maria Luisa’s work would attract more and more young women to join her.  This prompted the archbishop to suggest that she found a religious congregation, and he made the necessary arrangements in petitioning Rome for permission for Maria Luisa to affiliate her new community with the Discalced Carmelite Order.  Approval was given by His Holiness, Pope Benedict XV, and the Carmelite Sisters of the Sacred Heart was established on February 2, 1921. Maria Louisa’s charism “to unite the contemplative spirit of Carmel with the active apostolate” was born.

The enactment of the Mexican Constitution of 1917, brought with it a draconian anti-clericalism culminating in the most zealous persecution of the Church under the rule of Plutarco Elias Calles.  Calles stringently enforced the anti-clerical tenets of the Constitution, intent on stamping out religion in the country once and for all.  Churches were closed, church properties confiscated.  Religious services and the wearing of a religious habit or clerical garb in public was prohibited.  Religious orders and communities were disbanded, their members killed, exiled or forced into hiding.

Although sporadic violence occurred throughout the early 1920s in response to the state crackdown, by 1926, the passage and enforcement of even more stringent anti-clerical laws fueled full-fledged rebellion against Calles’ government, as armed conflict broke out with the Cristero War of 1926-1929.

During this period, Mother Luisita remained undaunted in her work of administering her schools, hospital, and orphanage despite constant scrutiny by the government.  However, she became increasingly concerned about her community of fifty-five sisters who were by now scattered throughout the countryside in hiding with friends and family.  Those who gave shelter to religious lived in great fear of discovery by the authorities.

The violence continued to escalate as the virulent religious persecutions overwhelmed Mexico, ultimately driving Mother Luisita from her homeland and the people she had so lovingly served.  In 1927, she left everything behind, and dressed in disguise, embarked on a perilous journey with two companion sisters, to seek refuge in the United States.

She fled Mexico knowing that all she had worked to establish over many years to benefit children, the poor, and the sick was being methodically destroyed.  Doubtless this was a painful blow to her. Yet through it all, Mother Luisita’s faith and trust in God’s providence never wavered. Mother Luisita and her companions arrived in Los Angeles in late June 1927, and in just a short time, her trust in God would be amply rewarded.  The very persecution which sought to destroy her work merely spread it to another land as her work quickly became established in the Archdiocese of Los Angeles.  The community quickly grew from its humble beginnings in 1927 consisting of three Sisters to 130 Sisters today.

In 1929, Mother Luisita returned to Mexico to re-establish and continue the work she had begun there, as well as guiding, visiting and directing the Sisters in southern California.  She spent the remainder of her life in hiding, ill and living in extreme poverty, often without sufficient food.

On February 11, 1937, shortly before 5:00 a.m., God called His faithful servant home to Himself.  The following day, Mother Luisita was laid to rest in the cemetery of Mezquitán in Guadalajara.  In 1942, her remains were secretly removed from Guadalajara and returned to her home in Atotonilco, Jalisco.  In 1998, her remains were placed in a special chapel in that town.

On July 1, 2000, the Year of the Great Jubilee, after extensive study of her life and writings, the Church declared that Mother Maria Luisa Josefa of the Most Blessed Sacrament lived a life of heroic virtue, bestowing on her the title of “Venerable”.  Her cause for canonization (sainthood) is currently in progress.