Murderer Invited to Vatican by Pope Francis

Photo ~ Sister Rani Maria in 1995 was traveling in a bus from Indore to Udayanagar and was stabbed more than 50 times. Although Samundar Singh was sentenced to life imprisonment after conviction, he …More
Photo ~ Sister Rani Maria in 1995 was traveling in a bus from Indore to Udayanagar and was stabbed more than 50 times. Although Samundar Singh was sentenced to life imprisonment after conviction, he was released in 2006 because of his "good conduct."
Bhopal/INDORE: Eighteen years after Samundar Singh brutally stabbed a Catholic nun in Madhya Pradesh and flung her on the roadside to bleed to death, the former convict has been invited to meet Pope Francis at the Vatican.
The nun, Sister Rani Maria, was stabbed 54 times inside a packed Indore-bound bus passing through Udainagar village in Dewas in February 1995. The nun died by the roadside.
“I am excited after getting the news,” 40-year old Singh told ucanews.com. He stabbed the Franciscan Clarist nun 54 times and left her to die on a road side at the behest of some landlords who had opposed her work among poor farm laborers.
Singh, who with the guidance of the Catholic priest became a Christian while serving a 12-year jail term, is busy …More
Reesorville
St Paul was a reformed accomplice to murder. And unlike this man, he didn't even spend one day in prison for his crime.
Why didn't Paul have to suffer for what he did? Because in Damascus he was baptized.
The teaching of the church, found in the catechism, is that baptism takes away all sins and all punishments due for sins committed prior to baptism. If this reformed convict was baptized in his …More
St Paul was a reformed accomplice to murder. And unlike this man, he didn't even spend one day in prison for his crime.

Why didn't Paul have to suffer for what he did? Because in Damascus he was baptized.

The teaching of the church, found in the catechism, is that baptism takes away all sins and all punishments due for sins committed prior to baptism. If this reformed convict was baptized in his course of conversion to the church (which we can assume he was) then he will not suffer even one day in purgatory for the murder because all the punishments for sins committed prior to baptism are wiped away in baptism. Confession, however, does not do that.

St Maria Goretti's killer gave his testimony about his actions, and it is really quite inspiring. I hope the movie they are making about this man can do the same:

""I'm nearly 80 years old. I'm about to depart.
Looking back at my past, I can see that in my early youth, I chose a bad path which led me to ruin myself.

My behavior was influenced by print, mass-media and bad examples which are followed by the majority of young people without even thinking. And I did the same. I was not worried.

There were a lot of generous and devoted people who surrounded me, but I paid no attention to them because a violent force blinded me and pushed me toward a wrong way of life.

When I was 20 years-old, I committed a crime of passion. Now, that memory represents something horrible for me. Maria Goretti, now a Saint, was my good Angel, sent to me through Providence to guide and save me.

I still have impressed upon my heart her words of rebuke and of pardon. She prayed for me, she interceded for her murderer. Thirty years of prison followed.
If I had been of age, I would have spent all my life in prison. I accepted to be condemned because it was my own fault.

Little Maria was really my light, my protectress; with her help, I behaved well during the 27 years of prison and tried to live honestly when I was again accepted among the members of society.

The Brothers of St. Francis, Capuchins from Marche, welcomed me with angelic charity into their monastery as a brother, not as a servant. I've been living with their community for 24 years, and now I am serenely waiting to witness the vision of God, to hug my loved ones again, and to be next to my Guardian Angel and her dear mother, Assunta.

I hope this letter that I wrote can teach others the happy lesson of avoiding evil and of always following the right path, like little children.
I feel that religion with its precepts is not something we can live without, but rather it is the real comfort, the real strength in life and the only safe way in every circumstance, even the most painful ones of life.
"

Signature, Alessandro Serenelli