Mother Angelica (1923-2016)

Mother Mary Angelica of the Annunciation ( born Rita Antoinette Rizzo), also known as Mother Angelica, was born on 20th April 1923 in Canton, Ohio.

She was a Catholic American Poor Clare nun best known for her television personality. She was the passionate founder of the internationally broadcast cable television network Eternal Word Television Nerwork (EWTN)(est.1981) and the radio network WEWN.

She began her broadcasting career on the radio. EWTN was established in a monastery garage. Under her leadership it became the largest and most influential Roman catholic media organization in the USA and one of the largest in the world. For her TV show Mother Angelica Live(1983-2001 a twice weekly homily she dressed in a traditional full habit and spoke in a straightforward and unaffected manner. It became the the voice for Catholics worldwide.

Mother Angelica came from a community of African-American and Italian immigrant workers. She was the only child of John and Mae Helen Rizzo (nee Gianfrancesco). Her father was by trade a tailor. He left after Angelica was 5. Parents divorced 2 years later. It was at the time of the Great depression and her mother struggled with chronic depression and poverty. They lived with her maternal grandparents -grandfather had a stroke which left him paralyzed.
*We pinched pennies just to keep food on the table.

She began to believe she had a vocation in the church when the effects of a stomach ailment ceased after she had visited a Roman catholic faith healer
In 1944 she joined the Poor Clares of Perpetual Adoration. In 1946 she was transfered to Canton. She took her final vows in 1953 and injured her back thet year. She made a commitment that if she was healed she would establish a new monastery. In 1962, with 4 other nuns she moved to Irondale Alabama, to establish a new community.

The TV and radio stations she started had 500 employees. They reached millions of households world wide.

In 2001 Mother Angelica had a stroke. her station EWTN continued to broadcast her homilies,

On 27th March 2016, aged 92, she died in the cloistered monastery she had founded in Hanceville, Alabama.

Mother Angelica probably reached more people than any other religious leader on earth, with the exception of the pope. Stephen Bates - The Guardian

EWTN currently broadcasts in 3 languages, 24 hours a day on satellite channels in more than 140 countries - potential audience 250 million households.

Sources used
Britannica Online Encyclopedia
The Guardian
Wikipedia