CHAPTER 1 A normal and pious childhood

I was born and raised in a devout Catholic family. My father inherited the faith of my grandmother Isa's family who had the habit of praying the rosary with all her six children. The mass at midnight on Christmas nights, devotion to Our Lady and to the saints of the Church were also passed down from generation to generation in the Almeida family.

In my mother's house, the inheritance of faith came from my grandfather's side, Jaime. My mother says that she remembers well the 'grandmother' Mira, my grandfather's mother, always with the rosary in her hand.

My parents met in Ribeirão Preto, in the interior of São Paulo, and they married there, although my father was from Birigui in the interior of São Paulo, and my mother from São Sebastião do Paraíso, in Minas Gerais. Although they are very different in temperament, profession, and even physically, the bond of faith, coupled with the goal and great will to form a Christian home, has united them from the beginning.

My mother always likes to remember that when she was very young, she went to Mass in Ribeirão Preto Cathedral and asked God for a husband to accompany her to Mass. Today I think that certainly pleases God with such a request.

My parents married on July 15, 1977, and had five children spread out over a period of 12 

years (almost 13). I am the second daughter. As the concern to transmit the faith to the five 

of us was a constant from the beginning, my brothers and I studied from a small Catholic 

school in Ribeirão Preto - Santa Úrsula College, most of the time; we also did six years of 

catechesis, that my siblings and I were watching with the sacrifice that children make when 

they leave toys and other things at home to hear about God.

My childhood was nothing extraordinary, though according to Chesterton, there is nothing

more extraordinary than an ordinary man, an ordinary woman, and their ordinary children.

Anyway, I have the best memories of life in the interior of São Paulo with my siblings and

 friends: playing at home; "Sandwich day," which happened every Friday night when my

 parents left for dinner and we stayed with Te (our beloved second mother, who lived with 

us for 30 years), vacation trips to Coroados, among others.

The good thing about living in a large family is that although we often have to make

compromises in our personal tastes, such as waiting to shower, giving in to a sister's friend, 

or even spending a holiday in one place not so nice to us but which is good for the younger

 siblings, we ended up having, later, the funniest stories. And even better: having a large 

family is always having someone who loves us endlessly in our tight time. Rafael Pich,

 a Spaniard who had sixteen children, used to say that in large families "difficulties are

 divided and joys are multiplied." 

I could write an extensive book with only the hilarious stories of my childhood and 

adolescence, while all of us still lived at home, but among these thousand adventures

 there are some that I consider the best.

The first one is perhaps the most characteristic of the two faces of the large family coin: 

the fact that for the parents this task can be, although very joyful, also arduous. 

When my younger sister was about seven years old, she decided to go to Mass 

with my mother. It was winter and night, and even the chapel 

being in front of our old house, my mother decided to go by car with Nina, my little sister. 

They were talking and my mother remembers that it was already the end of the day and 

she was exhausted. She got in the car, started and continued talking to my sister, until 

arriving at the College where the mass was celebrated in the little chapel. When she

 parked, she saw that Nina was not in the car.  She had forgotten the little one and only 

realised when she got there.

Recalling this and many other stories of our lives, we realise that we must always have 

a good mood to carry the cross each day, which always presents more lightly.

 St. Josemaria Escriva referred to these small or great contradictions of everyday life

 with a very happy expression: "the martyrdom of daily life." According to him, we, modern 

Christians, are called to follow Christ closely and for most of us living in the twenty-first

 century will not be required the shedding of our blood, but for all it is necessary to live 

gallantly the "martyrdom of daily life ". God has given us powerful weapons to confront 

him and one of them is prayer.

Some memories are emblematic of the fact that we have always been a family of prayer.

One of them are the trips and tours by car. When I was about fifteen, my father bought

 a Honda van - the famous Odissey, a spacious car with the third seat - something rare 

in Brazil at the time. My father did this so that we could go out with the whole family, not 

only on trips, but also on weekend trips and on other occasions. So, when we went out

 for dinner, we would talk, laugh, and sometimes, of course, fight like every big family. 

When we went out on the way home, my mother always said, "Let's make the most of

 it and pray?" And then she would begin to pray the usual prayer and then she would 

say: "Now, one more Hail Mary in the intention of the Pope. Another Hail Mary for the sick,

 plus a Hail Mary for the families ... ". Suddenly, my brother was saying: "Now let's pray a 

Hail Mary so mum will stop praying '...

Faith is certainly the greatest and best legacy that parents can and should leave to their 

children and it must begin to be practiced from an early age, since children learn by imitating 

and until a certain age, already advanced, parents are his greatest reference.

When I remember these facts, I think my parents taught us to pray not only with words, 

but also with example. "The word moves, but it is the example that drags". There are moving 

accounts of Catholics who have converted only by the strength of the examples of people

 close to them. Pope John Paul II always remembered the image of his father kneeling

 before the Blessed Sacrament. For him, this act was done with such piety by his father 

that he said that he already filled his heart with love for Jesus.

The concern of my parents in instilling the wonderful habit of prayer in us was not only

frequent but also perennial. It is well said that "love does not take vacations" and when

 we traveled during periods of recess, certainly faith had no rest. The first thing my father

 made sure of was the time of Mass at our destination. There was never, therefore, an 

excuse for not praying.