Read A Heart Most Worthy for Free Online Page B

would have immediately started confessing sins, but the things she’d done the week before, the thoughts she’d had that evening, refused to be categorized. They had seemed sinful . . . but were they really? What gave old Giuseppe the right to pinch her? And why should she do something for Theresa that Theresa was perfectly capable of doing for herself?
    Those weren’t sins.
    But . . . maybe her feelings were. Though she’d been exhilarated by her actions at first, they’d left her feeling peevish and foul-tempered. And hadn’t she just thought about doing something wrong? More than that she’d tried to justify the doing of wrong, hadn’t she? And worse, she’d desired it.
    “I’ve had thoughts, Father.”
    “Of what, my child?”
    “Of doing . . . wrong.”
    Annamaria Rossi? Doing wrong? On his side of the screen, Father Antonio leaned forward. What on earth could the girl be planning? “Have you done something wrong, then?”
    “No. I’ve just thought about it.”
    “About what?”
    “About . . . being bad.”
    “Why? In what way?”
    Here, then, is where it began to get tricky. Annamaria’s thoughts were subversive in the most dangerous sort of way. They were thoughts meant to entice. Thoughts that could, very possibly, seduce one into sin. But Annamaria hardly had the words to explain it, and Father Antonio could not conceive of it, at least not in conjunction with Annamaria Rossi, and so he remained dismissive and rather bemused when he should have been quite concerned.
    “It’s just – I’m not – it’s not fair, Father! It’s not fair that I should be kept from the things that I want. Not when everybody else is allowed to have them.” She despised herself for the tone in which she had spoken the words. Father Antonio must surely think her nothing but a whiny child. She wished she’d said nothing at all. But that was the point of confession, wasn’t it? To say things?
    “And what is it that you find yourself wanting?”
    “I want . . .” to be free. “I want a family, Father. I’d like to get married. I want to have children. What’s wrong with that?”
    “Nothing. There’s nothing wrong with that. But your life must be given over to service. You know that this must be.”
    “But . . . why? How do I know that this is what God demands?”
    “He made you, didn’t He?”
    He had.
    “And He placed you in your family, didn’t He?”
    He had.
    “And what is the commandment that He gave to sons and daughters?”
    “Honor your father and mother . . . ”
    “That your days may be long in the land which the Lord your God gives you.” How Father Antonio liked Annamaria Rossi! She was one of the only ones who still remembered her catechism.
    That my days may be long? Dear God, please, don’t curse me like that! How lonely all those days would be. “It just doesn’t seem fair that those are the things everyone would want for Theresa while they’re all denied to me.”
    “Nothing in this life is fair. And remember, our Lord Jesus came to serve, not to be served.”
    To serve. Suddenly the weight of the medal that hung around her neck seemed so heavy.
    “You know, my child . . . you can’t confess to a sin that you have not committed. I must ask if you have any others.”
    Annamaria’s cheeks flushed with shame. Of course she couldn’t. She hurried through the confession of her true sins and finally, she prayed. “O my God, I am heartily sorry for having offended thee. I detest all my sins because of thy just punishments, but most of all because they have offended thee, my God, who art all good and deserving of all my love. I firmly resolve, with the help of thy grace, to confess my sins, to do penance, and to avoid the near occasion of sin. Amen.”
    And so Father Antonio granted her absolution when he ought to have warned her to take great care. He prayed for her and assigned her ten Hail Mary’s and three rosaries as penance. “Give thanks to the Lord for He is