I. "Some, being not aware of it, have entertained angels."

Hebrews, xiii, 2

On a summer afternoon in 1754, a little girl was playing in one of the gardens of the Villa Redi, located in the suburbs of the lovely old Italian city of Arezzo. She would pluck a few flowers from one of the beds and then run with them to her mother, who was seated on a stone bench nearby. The mother would give in exchange for the flowers a sweet smile or soft caress, never permitting her eyes to stray for a second from observing the child's every movement. The mother's serene and beautiful features were beginning to live again in those of the little girl whose physical perfection and almost-visible purity of soul would suggest to one the thought of those little angels that peep forth from the master-pieces of the artist-mystic, Fra Angelico.

What a pretty picture that little creature made as she ran from bed to bed picking flowers and striving to make of them, together with those already in hand, a formal and well-ordered bouquet! She would smile at them tenderly, appearing to take the greatest delight in them. Even now flowers were holding strong sway over her heart which, in purest love, was already beginning to sing hymns of praise to that God to Whom the white and shining beauty of innocent simplicity is so dear.

When she thought she had plucked enough she ran, radiant with joy, to her mother to ask that all the little bunches be made into one large bouquet. Then she threw herself into her mother's arms, fondled her cheeks with her soft little hands, and, looking straight into her eyes, with a sweet and guileless smile, exclaimed all in a breath: "Mother dear, these are enough flowers for Jesus today, aren't they? ... Tell me, Who is God? ... I have heard that He is great. ... What is this greatness of His? ... and, if we must love Him above all else, what must a little girl like me do to please Him?"[1] The mother, deeply moved by the artless questions of her little girl, sought to satisfy this craving for knowledge by the method used on former occasions. Adapting her speech to the child's understanding, she spoke of God, of His greatness, of His love as shown for man in creation, of His will to live with men solely to gain their love, and ended with the statement that Jesus has a greater love than He has for flowers for those hearts that love Him, those hearts that aspire to nothing but virtue and holiness. How that little heart throbbed in that small breast! It became the fixed aspiration of that little soul to become and remain holy just to please Jesus! A kiss on the mother's forehead was thanks for the instruction received, and, at the same time, a seal set on an inner resolution ... always to be good and virtuous, solely to please Jesus!

The story of that pretty little angel who at the dawn of life gave such promise of a saintly future is worth the telling.

In 1754 the "Villa Redi," a title held in reverence by intellectual Italians because of the many members of the Redi family who have brightened the pages of Italian history, was the name of an estate in the possession of Cavalier Ignatius Redi, Arezzo-born, and his wife, Camilla Ballati, a native of Siena. Ignatius' father, Gregory, was the nephew of a poet and naturalist, Francis Redi, and, although forgotten today, in his own time was himself rated as no mean poet. His works, among which was a fine rendition of the Psalms, were published in four volumes by his son Ignatius who prefaced them with a letter of dedication to Cardinal Enriquez. The Redi family was one of those cultured noble families that never forgot love and reverence for God, one of those families over whose members held sovereign sway that Christian spirit which today is sadly lacking in the households of most of those of exalted rank.

On July 15, 1747, the vigil of the Feast of Our Lady of Mt. Carmel, was born to Ignatius and Camilla Redi, the representatives of that historic family, the lovely child we saw playing in the garden, a child already giving promise of that sanctity which was to make her one of her native land's most precious and brilliant gems. The day after her birth, Our Lady of Mt. Carmel's own day, she was baptized and placed under the protection of Our Blessed Lady and her mother, the names assigned to her by her parents being Maria and Anna. Her father gives us this record of her baptism. ... "I had her baptized on July 16, 1747, by my brother, John Baptist, Canon Redi, in St. Peter's Cathedral, Arezzo. The god-father by proxy was the papal legate of Ravenna, His Eminence, Henry Cardinal Enriquez, for whom she was held at the font by my father, Milord the Ball Gregory Redi."[2]

Besides Anna Maria, who was the second born, the Redis had several other children, Gregory Henry, the only son not destined to be a priest; Cecilia Maria, who became Sister Angela Theresa of the Convent of Saint Apollonia; Francis Xavier, who first entered the Society of Jesus, then on its suppression, became dean of the Arezzo cathedral; Eleonora Maria, who became Sister Mary Gertrude of Saint Apollonia's Convent; Father Joseph Mary, a Theatine; James, first a Jesuit, then, after the suppression, a canon of Arezzo cathedral; and Theresina, born in 1776, six years after Saint Theresa Margaret's death.

God visited little Anna Maria Redi with his special love even in her babyhood and gave to her heart and mind the beginnings of heavenly beauty. From her very infancy, entranced with the loveliness of heaven, she could not prevent the splendor of that spirit that is so pleasing to God, that spirit of sincerity and docility engendered by innocence, from shining through and lighting up her countenance. She was only seven years old when we discovered her plucking flowers in the garden, and, if one thought then that he was gazing at an angel, it was because the Heart of Jesus had already sprayed that child's soul with a first ray of His all-compelling love. She seemed to understand already the secret of the mission to which God was calling her ... that as the Evangelist says, "God is Love," and that, therefore, to please God, her every act, from beginning to end, must be the work of love.

Her overwhelming desire to know "Who He is, what that greatness of His is, what must be done to please Him" shows that she already loved God truly, a fact that she herself could confirm later when she said of her childhood inclinations, "Jesus, Thou well knowest that even when I was a little girl I had no other wish than to please God and become a saint." She deliberately set her feet on the path to sainthood when, almost at reason's dawn, she began to add, by little and little, to her natural gifts of soul those virtues that are bound gradually to mould a human being into its most perfect state, that of sanctity. Tenderness of conscience; love of retirement, recollection, and prayer; profound respect for parental authority; true humility; common sense and good judgment ... qualities, all, that formed her childhood into a fitting prelude to a youth of pronounced sanctity.

Once, when she was asked by Father Ildephonse of St. Aloysius Gonzaga, a Discalced Carmelite, if she had begun to render heartfelt homage to that Heavenly Lord Whom she professed to love so much, she replied ingenuously, under the conviction that everyone followed instinctively the dictates of love for the Supreme Good the moment knowledge of God came into his heart, "Everyone does," as if to say, "How could I not love God since everyone loves Him?"[3] One can realize, therefore, that when this little girl wept softly at hearing of the labors of the saints, of the trials and sufferings of the martyrs, or of some phase of Christ's Passion, her tears were not tears of pity and commiseration but tears of joy and understanding.

Although she was only seven years of age, already had the hopes and aspirations of her pure little heart found their resting place in the Lord. God was her sole delight. She spoke of Him at all times. As in the case of Saint Mary Magdalen de' Pazzi, the mute appeal of the flowers and of all God's non-rational creation incited her to admiration of God's greatness so that with this same great saint she could exclaim, "Sweet Jesus, how good Thou art!" It became a fixed and easy habit for her to pass from things created to the love of the Creator. Even after she became a religious, herbs, flowers, plants of all kinds, even the insects that fed upon them, touched her heart and filled it with love for the Creator. "How well do these innocent creatures of God," she exclaimed to her confessor one day, "teach me to love Him and to respond to His love." With the flowers she offered Jesus she would give her whole heart, begging Him to bless the flowers, herself, her mother, her father, her words of offering and petition consisting of the sweet and tender prayers learned at her mother's knee. One of her aunts relates that frequently she saw the little girl gazing fixedly towards heaven as if, meditating on God's greatness and awful majesty, she were sending up to Him the outpourings of her adoring and loving heart.

One of the Redi household customs was to say night prayers in common. Our angelic little girl would kneel beside her mother, fold her hands, lift her eyes to the statue of Our Lady, and ask that dear Mother to watch over her and to open her heart to her Son's holy inspirations. How efficacious must be the prayers of a mother for her children when she prays for them and with them! Would that all mothers would kneel every night with their children before the God Who loves little ones so much! How many tears would go unshed, what peace would reign in families! Our Anna Maria was fortunate; her rapid growth in virtue gave her family cause to look forward to her future with eager and pleasurable anticipation ... that future was never endangered by the bad example careless and indifferent parents can give ... Anna Maria's parents were the exemplars of virtues that must, perforce, bring to life in the child-heart only the tenderest sentiments of filial reverence, love, and devotion.

Anna Maria made her first confession when she was seven years old, in 1754. She must have received her first absolution with the greatest piety. For even the most trivial of faults she had only horror. The mere mention of sin, as such, or the slightest word that could be in any sense offensive to God would make her blush. Whenever she reflected on the wretched state of those who failed in their love for the Supreme Good, she would say, weeping uncontrollably, "How can men do such things ... God's dumb creatures never break His law!"

Her confessors were deeply moved, indeed astounded, by her absolute innocence and her utterly unselfish love of God, and have affirmed in the Canonical Process for her Beatification that she always "retained her angelic purity and her baptismal innocence." Her father, from close association, had intimate knowledge and appreciation of her simplicity and greatness of soul, but even he had reason to be astonished one day when they were returning from the Capuchin church after confession ... she spoke of the Sacrament of Penance, its institution, its utility, its healing qualities, its revealing of the goodness of God, in such glowing terms as to leave no doubt in his mind as to the intensity of the flame of love that fired her heart. This conversation that took place when she was not quite ten years of age was a fitting prelude to what was to happen in the Monastery later when, hearing one of the nuns narrate a shameful occurrence, she exclaimed, "Is it possible that anyone can so offend God!" and fell fainting to the ground. No one could be so affected unless she were in the superhuman loveliness of virginal purity. Anna Maria's earliest years were spent in preparing her soul for entrance into a state which it would never leave. As a child of ten she was already following the immaculate Spouse Who was to crown her brow with the shining aureola prepared for those who love Him.

[1] Canonical Process for Beatification.

[2] The title "Bali" was assigned to the head or prior of an order of knights that was, perhaps, religious in the same sense and to the same degree as is the Holy Military Order of Malta; besides the title of "Bali" this head or prior was authorized to use that of "Mon-signore" or "Milord." There is no doubt that such a title existed in the Redi family, for several letters of the years 1817 and 1818 addressed to the Discalced Carmelites of Florence are signed by the "Ball" Francis Xavier Redi, Saint Theresa Margaret's brother.

[3] Father Ildephonse was a great natural scientist, and even a greater religious. He was Saint Theresa Margaret's spiritual director, and one of the chief witnesses during the canonical process before her beatification. At Pope Clement XIV's command, he wrote a treatise on her life and virtues, the first formal biography of this holy woman.

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