XV. "And they cried one to another, and said, 'Holy, Holy, Holy, the Lord God of Hosts, the earth is full of Thy glory.'"

Isaias vi, 3

Love of one's neighbor is merely an effect of the love of God: He that loveth not, knoweth not God; for God is charity," says the Evangelist (I John, iv., 8) . Sister Theresa Margaret drew her love for her neighbor chiefly from the Blessed Sacrament to which she was devoted. The altar where Jesus lives and breathes love was always calling her. At Holy Communion she would press her lips to Christ's side and drink charity from His Divine Heart. This was the secret of her unchangeable, unquenchable love. She could never forget all that Jesus has done for us, all that He has suffered for love of us, and would seek to counter-balance that great love to some extent by meeting halfway every kind of mortification. Her cross she was ever ready to embrace, saying, "God has suffered so much for me that it is only just that I suffer a little for Him." When she felt that her spirit was weakening a bit, perhaps becoming somewhat faint under its load of humiliation and penance, in the greatest distress she would bewail this seeming yielding to the flesh with words like these, "This is not the way my Jesus treated me!"

Motionless before Jesus in the Blessed Sacrament, Sister Theresa Margaret would spend hours in profound adoration. There before the Tabernacle she would kneel, hands joined, face radiating peace and happiness, but, withal, so modestly and humbly as to fire anew her watching Sisters' faith in the Sacrament of Love. There before the altar she would ascend from contemplation to ecstasy and, sometimes, from ecstasy to complete enrapturement of self in God. The nuns, loath to lose sight of her, often found her stationary and motionless before the altar of the Host, her hands folded under her scapular, her face alight with the love of God.[1]

"I remember seeing her, once, entering the choir while the Blessed Sacrament was exposed," said Mother Anna Maria of St. Anthony of Padua in her deposition. "I saw her genuflect before the altar, so composed and recollected as to seem lost in her veiled Lord, and, seeing her thus, I could not but know that her understanding of the great God must indeed be great."[2] "Her angelic composure," said another, "was enough to set anyone thinking. I am sure that she lived from day to day in this thought, 'Indeed the Lord is in this place ... eyes to earth, heart to God.'"

She never wearied of preaching to the rest of the nuns the great humility of Our Lord in putting up with the irreverences and slights offered Him in His own house. When she thought of Christ's loneliness in so many of our churches throughout the day, particularly during carnival time when so many of our people are almost sacrilegious in their neglect of Jesus in the Tabernacle, she would weep bitterly and, between sobs, tell how deeply the Divine Heart was wounded by this treatment, and she would picture Christ saying to her, "Behold this Heart Which has loved men so much and is badly treated by them in return!" Her grief for the sins of all would then double in intensity, and, hastening to her Sisters, she would say with Saint Mary Magdalen de' Pazzi, "Love is not loved, Love is not loved!"

Very frequently during Mass, especially after Communion, she was seen to be so radiant in countenance as to warrant the belief of beholders that she was rapt in God. The nuns, deeply moved, would gaze upon her, wondering what was going on between her and the Divinity. Sister Theresa Margaret's very manner of speaking of the Blessed Sacrament was such as to stir up in her Sisters' hearts a love like hers. Her thoughts constantly reverted to the Eucharistic Lord, and, as some of the nuns have attested, even while she was doing her work with the rest she made frequent acts of adoration, always seeing to it that she sat or stood in such a way as always to face the chapel. When she went to rest, furthermore, she always managed to lie so as to have her face turned towards the chapel walls.

It is safe to say that by this time Sister Theresa Margaret had the state of union with God that is beyond explanation or illustration by human tongue. Her life was one with that of Jesus, one her love, one her heart. That Divine Heart, living and breathing in the Sacrament of Its love, drew her to Itself and wholly absorbed her. The thought that God had chosen her as His spouse, the seeing herself now a nun, filled her being with the greatest contentment, for now she was able more freely to give her heart full liberty to seek its God, to search for the light of His Divine Countenance which would, as in David's case, shed upon her the "spirit of grace." Often, with the greatest of joy, she would exclaim, "I live in the very same house with Jesus in the Eucharist."

A Servant of God, the Venerable Menochio, once wrote the religious of Saint Theresa's Convent a letter that had much to say of Sister Theresa Margaret. In it she was likened to Saint Aloysius, and the Sisters were urged to go to her in their needs and to imitate her, especially in her love for God. Like the angelic Saint Aloysius, in her innocence and love, from the day of her First Holy Communion she had followed the sacred custom of dividing the long hours between Communions into two parts, spending the first part in acts of gratitude and thanksgiving, since the first part followed Communion; the second in acts of love and desire, since this second part was in reality a lengthy preparation for her next Communion. When now and then she could not go to Communion, great grief came to her. In those days no one went to Communion every day; therefore, to be deprived of Communion for one reason or another on days set for its reception was a real spiritual calamity for Sister Theresa Margaret.

The Saint was frequently heard thanking God for having called her to an Order that is so devoted to Christ in the Eucharist, and that celebrates with such pomp solemnities that have to do with the Blessed Sacrament, such as Corpus Christi. When she was made sacristan, she could diversify her devotion to the Sacrament of Love. With what zeal and solicitude did she set about the most laborious tasks connected with work in the sacristy and sanctuary! The cleaning of the choir-chapel and the scouring of the lamps were done so contentedly and so reverentially that anyone could see how much regard she had for her new office. The cultivating and selecting flowers for Jesus in the Sacrament she regarded as the most honorable and delightful work imaginable, and she never forgot where to seek in the garden for the most beautiful blossoms for Christ's own altar! Flowers still had for Sister Theresa Margaret Redi a language of their own, touching on the divine! With them she adorned the choir-altar, for in them she saw symbolized the loveliness, sweetness, and mystical fragrance of the nuns' prayers, and the beauty in the sight of God of the souls sending up those prayers.

From her First Communion day, and even more so from the first day of her novitiate, her heart had beaten only for Jesus in the Eucharist, her tongue had spoken only His praise. During her sacristanship, she was never known to utter an idle or useless word in the choir or in the rooms adjacent to it. She always felt the drawing power of Christ in the Tabernacle; whenever she passed through rooms or corridors opposite the altar of the Blessed Sacrament, she always genuflected, and would do the same, if she thought no one was watching her, even in rooms far from the chapel.

One of Sister Theresa Margaret's ardent desires was that all creatures become victims of charity and pour into the Heart of Jesus the libations of their love and sacrifices. Particularly, would she have it that, like the seraphim seen by Isaias vying with each other in the alternate singing of God's praises, Saint Theresa's nuns,

"Doves that at the call of spring,
Ope and shut their wings in rhythm
Through the crystal air aflying
Straight to nest of dear desire."
(Inferno, V, 32)

vie with each other in the taking into their hearts the Eucharistic King and in the spending of hours and hours of loving colloquy with Him.

One day (the exact date is November 13, 1764), when Sister Theresa Margaret was working in the choir and, with mind fixed on the Tabernacle, was contemplating and adoring Jesus in His immeasurable love, she saw a small fragment of host fall from the communion-rail which she was dusting. The thought that the fragment might be consecrated darted into her mind, dispelling all peace. She ran quickly to the Prioress and the chief Sacristan to acquaint them with what had happened. Then she returned to the choir-chapel and, prostrating herself before the fragment, abandoned herself to grief in the thought that perhaps Jesus had been treated irreverently. She did not rise to her feet until Friar Ildephonse, at the Mother Prioress' request, came to put the fragment back in the ciborium.[3] The incident made a deep impression on the Servant of God. Frequently she referred to it, tenderly and regretfully. "On my return to the confessional," Friar Ildephonse relates, "either that day or the next, I forget which exactly, she came to me, sent, I believe, by the Superiors, that I might quell the vehement agitation the incident had stirred up within her. With regard to the whole matter well can I testify, and hereby do testify, that the discovery of the neglected fragment of Host had injected into her soul an even greater insight into and comprehension of God's Majesty humiliated for us than she had had before ... and her previous insight and comprehension had by no means been slight. Furthermore, I can and do state that, no matter what I did to reassure her, I was unable to reassure her that day or any day later in her life when the matter was mentioned ... only a few times was the matter brought up, but, each time, she reminded me in grateful words of the part I had taken, while recalling the whole incident with deep reverence and, at the same time, great horror."[4]

Perhaps it was to reward her for such great love and veneration for the Holy Eucharist that Our Lord granted her a singular grace, that of perceiving a heavenly savor and a sweet odor every time she approached the Holy Table. As she passed the Sisters who had already communicated, a delightful odor from which she could hardly bear to withdraw, made known to her Our Lord's nearness. Even before she had been clothed in the holy habit, at the time when she was suffering from the infected knee, whenever the Mother Assistant Mistress of Novices would enter her cell after Communion to minister to her wants, the Saint would do everything possible to keep her near her bed, saying playfully that the Mistress gave off the "odor of sanctity."

"Frequently," testifies this Mother, "she drew me to her and pressed her nose against my garments, but I paid little attention to this behavior, considering it a bit of childish nonsense, but, when she persisted in it even after she had been clothed in the habit, I began to do some observing and thinking, and noticed that she acted this way more on days on which I had received Holy Communion than on others, and that one day, while she was standing as near me as she could get and I was telling her something she must do, she paid no attention to me, although the matter was urgent, and kept saying, 'What a lovely smell comes from you!' at the same time inhaling with apparent delight. I was astonished, and was unable, with all my thinking, to recall having touched any sweet-smelling object."

When the Saint was asked to describe this "odor of sanctity," she replied that it made her think of that given off by a flower called by the Arettines "Moschettone," our narcissus.[5] In her artless way, she took for granted that the sweetness of smell and taste she derived from Holy Communion was common to all! One morning after she had received with the rest of the nuns, she asked, in all simplicity and innocence, Mother Anna Maria of St. Anthony of Padua the significance of the delightful odor and taste perceived in the Sacred Species. The Mother was too surprised by the question to make any response at the time, but she could not help marveling at the workings of God in that dear soul so wholly taken up with love of His Son in the Eucharist.

More than once, the Saint asked her confessor why sometimes she felt greater sensible pleasure in Jesus Christ in Holy Communion, at other times less, thus convincing the priest that she had frequent experience of this phenomenon. Questioned by him as to the quality of the sense impression, the Saint could find no terms for comparison and always contented herself with calling it "the taste of Jesus Christ." In order not to deprive her of her childlike simplicity, the priest stated that, since this sense impression is not a necessary effect of the Sacrament, "the Lord was Master and could grant it when, to what extent, and to whom He would, and that, therefore, she should receive it with gratitude, without speaking of it to anyone except her father confessor ... and that, perhaps, change of degree in perception indicated the greater or lesser disposition and love with which one communicated." This grace was habitual with her, the Lord tasting sweeter and more alluring to her on the more solemn feast days of the year.

Her love for the Eucharist was almost matched by her devotion to the Sacred Heart. It was this devotion that had prompted her to ask on the day of her clothing that the second part of her title in religion be "of the Sacred Heart of Jesus." Thereby she would, as she told her confessor, "signify her duty to live and to breathe only by returning to Him His love with all her might and in her every action." "It is her name," said Our Holy Father, Pius XI., in his discourse of March 3, 1929, while reading the decree of approbation of the miracles recorded for her Beatification, "it is her name that is the secret force behind all these marvels, the name of the Sacred Heart. That name shows the intimacy between her heart and the Divine Heart. Her choice of name was the first fruit of devotion to the Sacred Heart, a devotion that, in those days, had to fight for life among difficulties that would seem absurd in these days ... yet real difficulties they were, difficulties born of the frigid zeal and wayward tendency of a group of fanatics who knew nothing of the love of God while claiming to have intimate knowledge and comprehension of His divine majesty and grandeur. It is not hard for us to see, now, why it is that the Divine Spirit, the Supreme Author of the glory and beauty surrounding this holy person, fixed the hour for the honoring of Himself by this faithful and heroic spouse, and now, after the passing of so many years, should finally have called her out of obscurity into light and brilliance by that powerful voice of miracles which is truly His own voice."

Sister Theresa Margaret felt that she was making the Sacred Heart a promise when she chose to be called "of the Heart of Jesus." That promise she kept. During the retreat of 1768 she wrote, "My God, no other wish have I than to be a perfect copy of You, and, since Your life was mainly a hidden one of humiliation, love, and sacrifice, so mine must be... You know well that my sole longing is to be a victim of Your Sacred Heart, wholly consumed as a holocaust in the flame of Your holy love." One reads in the depositions that "When, in 1767, our Order received from the Congregation of Rites the decree permitting the use of the Office and Mass of the Sacred Heart, her devotion took on new ardor and that, since she was sacristan at the time, she asked and obtained permission from the Mother Prioress and the Mother Mistress of Novices to decorate the statue, to give it a place upon the choir-altar, and to join the other Sisters in the saying of special prayers in honor of the Sacred Heart during the time of community recreation."

On fire with this divine flame, she acquired that limitless trustfulness that seems proper to Saints. She would address Jesus by the sweet name of "Father," and call Him tenderly "her good Father, full of love and bounty," because, to use her own words, "in this name, she felt comforted in her extreme wretchedness and unworthiness, and encouraged to address a God so great, so just, so powerful."[6]

Raised day by day to higher and yet higher planes of spiritual perfection by the ardor of love instilled into her heart by God, she became so on fire with the desire of martyrdom that her tender words, her longing prayers, her generous impulses moved the Sisters to compassion. The story of Saint Theresa who, when she was but seven years old, fled with her brother Roderic from her father's house to go to Africa, there to spread the faith and to shed her blood for Jesus, inspired Sister Theresa Margaret with like desire ... she already felt herself under the slayer's sword, she felt the blow, she felt herself flying from this world of blood straight into her Savior's arms! This was not the kind of martyrdom that Christ was to exact of her, however ... hers was to be the torture of those who love and cannot possess the Beloved. The far-awayness of Jesus, the pangs of abandonment, the delay of death that frees and leads to Him Who has wounded the heart, this was the martyrdom awaiting her, this the martyrdom that, the longer it endured, was to become the more painful and grievous.

This angelic woman had longed to live on love, and her life had truly become a sublime hymn that sang only the love of God. In all she did of labor, whether manual or mental, her heart was never separated from God but did all it had to do in union with Him, putting into practice one of the Saint's most beautiful sayings, "If we live and have our being in God it is impossible for His love and companionship to be a stumbling-block to our external actions." She would often say that experience had taught her that it was enough to work in silence, according to the Rule, for then everything was done with the greatest perfection, with the mind lifted to God, and with the greatest possible quickness and punctuality. Thus external works were actually a help to her, raising her mind to God and offering her new motives for loving Him. She would say, "It is enough to keep the outer doors closed so that heart and soul can go nowhere except to their proper center, which is God... He, Who is the mainspring, the principle of our every act that is good, helps us well and quickly in our work"; and again, "If only with obedience and by obedience we work here in this Monastery where it is God Who commands, it does not seem to me that He can destroy His very own work." It is not hard for us to see why it was easier for Sister Theresa Margaret to remain always united to God in thought and in love than to join forces with His enemies ... the Saint thought that this union with God was ordinary, common to all!

Frequently her confessor interested himself in luring her into arguments on the goodness and generosity of God, and on the absolutely efficacious mediation of Jesus Christ. How well she understood the sense of these words of the Apostle, "We have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the just" (I St. John, ii., i) ... she became so enthusiastic that, forgetting her customary reticence and habit of recollection, she broke out into exclamations of the most ardent nature... "What a wonderful favor ... our good Jesus, so gloriously reigning at the right hand of the Father, bothers about our base wretchedness and miseries, and as a humble Advocate, deigns for us to plead with His Father!" ... "How wonderful that our good Jesus, even while we are sleeping, or while we are diverting ourselves, not giving a thought either to Him or to ourselves, never ceases to plead to the Eternal Father in our behalf!"

For those of her Sisters whom she sometimes saw in distress she always had only words of comfort and hope, "Recommend yourselves to God, and have no doubt about the consolation He will give you. Trust in Him! What is there to fear? If God has promised to hear us every time we have recourse to Him, trust in Him; He is with us and wishes us every good, and He cannot possibly abandon us."

"This great trustfulness of hers, this absolute abandonment of self to God," Mother Anna Maria of St. Anthony of Padua tells us, "she sought to arouse or to increase in everyone of us on every possible occasion ... thus, whenever she knew that anyone was suffering and in distress, she would stir up the sufferer's confidence in God and drive out her doubt, stating that God would bring good out of everything, urging that recourse be had to Him since He wished to be petitioned by us; on many occasions she saw to the depths of my own soul, and her words to me were always a comfort and solace."

When some occasional disturbing cause, such as must come into the life of any community, would upset the Monastery, the Saint would always counsel prayer and silence to anyone asking her advice. One of her sayings was, "Speaking of things that concern God alone binds, in a certain measure, the hands of His divine liberality, simply because there is evidence of too great human solicitude such as is found in small and private human affairs; whereas, on the other hand, prayer and silence effect that total abandonment of self to the loving and paternal vigilance of God above, total abandonment which is the right arm of prayer, as He Himself wished to make us understand when He said, 'Delight in the Lord, and He will give thee the requests of thy heart' (Psalm xxxvi., 4)."

Saint Theresa Margaret of the Sacred Heart of Jesus never failed in boundless confidence in Divine Providence, Divine Wisdom, and Divine Love, and, we have evidence, reaped the reward of that supreme confidence. Her prayers, sooner or later, were always answered. Friar Ildephonse tells us the result of her prayers for a hardened sinner in whom he was interested; he had asked her to pray constantly for the rest of her life for this person whom nothing seemed to move; the Saint never forgot his request; at the moment of her death news came to the earnest friar that his protégée had returned to God's grace. Furthermore, the nuns who had observed the effects of the Saint's unlimited confidence in God attested at the deposition that it was enough for the Servant of God merely to bring her desire before the Savior in mental prayer, or to say before Jesus in the Eucharist the psalmist's words "Lord, all my desire is before Thee" (Psalm xxxii., l0)) without specifying the desire, to be heard and answered!

At this period of her short life, Sister Theresa Margaret had reached her highest point of perfection ... a little while, and the holocaust of this little victim shall have been consummated.

[1] Can. Proc.

[2] Can. Proc.

[3] Can. Proc.

[4] Can. Proc.

[5] Can. Proc.

[6] Can. Proc.

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