 After receiving her First Communion at about age 12, she began to participate in the life of the local parish, teaching catechism to children, visiting the sick and cleaning the local chapel.On 12 July 1890, Visintainer and her friend, Virginia Rosa Nicolodi, under the spiritual direction of a Jesuit priest, Luigi Rossi, committed their lives to religious service, under dedication to the Immaculate Conception of Our Lady.They began by caring for a woman suffering from terminal cancer, in a small house was which was donated to the small community and the young girls began a schedule of religious living.