III. "And Thou shalt make them drink of the torrent of Thy pleasure."

Psalm xxxv, 9

Anna Maria's First Communion day meant for her a second step towards Jesus. From the moment she had attained the use of reason she had ardently longed for that day's coming. The Victim of Love's tender pleadings had often strangely moved, often exalted her heart, and, now that her longing to be one with Jesus in the Eucharist was about to be realized, she could hardly keep her feelings within bounds. A new, delightful, infinite tenderness filled her heart to repletion.

Our Saint had been taught that in the sacred tabernacle throbs not only love but the very Heart of Love Which is the sanctuary of Divine Love, that Heart Which loves men so much, that Heart that yearns to be known and loved in the Sacrament of Its Love. That Heart had drawn her to Itself by Its fragrance, and had wholly captivated her long before she realized what Its power of attraction is, long before she had experienced the wonders of Its effects. Ardent love for the Blessed Sacrament had already become a glorious part in her program of life, enkindling in her soul ever-new desires for attainment of and progress in virtue, ever-strong longings for sanctity, ever-pure flames of devotion.

In order to make proper preparation to receive Jesus for the first time Anna Maria would have liked to spend many hours of the day before the Blessed Sacrament, but feared to ask for permission. Besides, she had many duties to fulfil, so, since she could give little of her daylight hours, she decided to devote some of the hours of night to prayer. It pleased her to offer this sacrifice of her evening hours to the Lord, provided that sacrifice could be known only to herself and to Jesus, but such a sacrifice could not remain undiscovered long. The curiosity of her already suspicious companions became so lively that they succeeded in uncovering her secret in a short time. Her little sister, Eleonora, was hardly more than a baby, so was permitted to room with the Servant of God. Anna Maria's playmates made use of this little creature to verify their suspicions; in all simplicity the little girl told them exactly what they wished to know, that is, that, at night, Anna Maria spent hours in prayer. The Servant of God was deeply hurt by this ingenuous betrayal; she scolded her little sister severely, and did a bit of weeping on her own account, but all to no purpose since now the secret was no longer a secret.

At last came the great day! Once more she reviewed her pure and innocent life and, seeming to find in it some shadow of imperfection, decided to make a general confession. Then her heart was ready to receive the Divine Heart. Hers had been a long preparation like that of the angelic youth, Aloysius Gonzaga, whose example she had set herself to follow.

The night preceding that great day Anna Maria was unable to sleep. She made her First Communion on Assumption Day, 1757, and that day's dawn found her on her knees in prayer. After the rising hour she startled and edified her teachers by kneeling before them and asking pardon for any faults she might have committed. Then, clothed in spotless white, Anna Maria approached the altar. When the priest descended to give her the Sacred Host, she gazed at It in ineffable happiness, her eyes shining with tears.

How describe the sweet soaring of that loving heart! At that moment, the Servant of God felt that she possessed the Infinite, that everything for which she had longed had now been granted her, felt that she herself was great and almost boundless, that she was being lifted up to sublime heights since now she was pressing to her heart God Himself! Then it seemed to her that the fragrance of flowers, which from babyhood had appealed to her senses, had only the faintest likeness to that perfume with which the Divine Flower was now embalming her soul. All earth's harmonies could never have given her even a vague idea of the sweet music of that voice which was now telling her in her heart what Saint Margaret Mary Alacoque was told, "I am your life. You shall live only in Me, and through Me." In ecstasy, in a transport of purest love, she asked what best gift she could now offer Jesus and learned that now it could be only her whole self, so, freely and entirely, she gave to Him her heart, her soul, her intellect, her will, her whole being. The Sacred Heart had challenged Anna Maria. Her triumph over that Heart consisted in her unhesitating and complete surrender to It. God had "proved her as gold in the furnace, and as a victim of a holocaust He had received her" (Wisdom, III, 6). Henceforth, the Divine Lover was to bathe her soul in His love, to make it sweeter, humbler, simpler, purer, that one day it might become one of Carmel's rarest flowers.

On that, her First Communion Day, Anna Maria's joy was full and entire. Throughout the day there lingered on her angelic face the reflection of the inner light that sprang from the flame that had fired her heart during Communion. That day was the fore-runner of others that were to be, if possible, even more joyful, of days that were to see blooming in that chosen soul fragrant flowers of virtue smiling under the sun of God's love, sparkling with the dew of Christ's merits.

The glory and the sweet serenity of Anna Maria's First Communion Day, the graces it brought her, all made a deep impression on her soul. Love and knowledge increased with her cooperation with divine grace. Thereafter, every time that she approached the altar to receive Our Savior, she made the same preparation, but always with increasing fervor. One reads in the convent annals of her time that "profoundly impressed with the holiness of the Great Mystery, she went to the sacred table each time with the same disposition of heart. The fruit of her Communion was a carefulness, ever increasingly vigilant, in fleeing from even the shadow of what could offend God, a solicitude, ever increasingly active, in seeking faithfully in her every action to do only what could be God's greatest pleasure."

Yet, what anxiety was hers, what fears tormented her virgin heart when she reflected that she carried the treasure of all her virtues in a vessel of fragile clay, and that she might even by the smallest fault displease Jesus! Once she became so frightened at the thought that she had committed a venial sin that she wept the whole night through and found peace only after her confessor had assured her that her fear had no foundation, that what she had thought was a venial sin was merely a vain apprehension.

From such a life as Anna Maria lived at school the step to the cloister is a short one. The one thing necessary was the voice of the Master calling, and that beloved Master did not make her wait long for the call.

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