She was born in 1786 in the town of Saludecio, the second child of seven of a prosperous couple, Giambattista Renzi, a respected appraiser, and Vittoria Boni, a member of a noble family in Urbino.

At the age of 21, she was admitted to a monastery of Augustinian nuns in Pietrarubbia, in the Marche, located at a high elevation and therefore noted for its isolation and poverty.

[2] Seeking new direction in her life, Renzi sought guidance from her spiritual director, through whom she was led to the village of Coriano, where she arrived on 29 April 1824 and took charge of a school established to educate poor girls and young women of the region.

[1] Renzi initially sought to place the school under the administration of the Canossian Sisters to provide it greater stability.

Renzi then drew a group of women seeking deeper spiritual lives who were also drawn to the education of the poor.

In 1828 she organized them into an unofficial religious community, which she called the Poor Women of the Crucified, for whom she wrote a Rule of Life.

At that time, the bishop gave the community their current name and placed them under the Rule of the Filippini Sisters based in Rome.

The process - which granted her the posthumous title of Servant of God - closed in 1968 and received formal ratification to show it completed its work according to the criteria.