Maria Francesca Pastore, also known as Sister Letizia, the oldest living nun in Italy, passed away in Bitonto, Apulia, on 30 July, at the age of 110 years, 287 days.
Maria Francesca Pastore was born in Santeramo in Colle, Apulia, Italy, on 16 October 1915. She spent her childhood on the family farmhouse in Gioia del Colle. In the 1930s, she suffered the loss of her mother, who died of breast cancer at the age of 42. At 25, in 1940, she entered religious life and became a nun. When choosing her religious name, she took the name Letizia in honor of her mother — a name that had also been borne by several women in her maternal lineage.
In 1966, her father passed away at the age of 88 from colorectal cancer. During this period, she moved to the Monastery of the Virgins in Bitonto, where she patiently and meticulously devoted herself to the art of bookbinding, restoring volumes damaged by the 1966 Florence flood, and to cultivating the art of miniature painting.
Coincidentally, she passed away on the same day as Sister Rosario Soto of Spain, Europe’s oldest living nun, who was 112 years old.
We extend our heartfelt condolences to the family and loved ones of Sister Letizia during this difficult time.
