On the afternoon of July 5, 1902, 11-year-old Maria Goretti was sitting at the top of a staircase in a farmhouse in Italy, mending clothes while watching over her younger siblings as her mother worked in the fields nearby.
Then came the footsteps.
A 20-year-old young man named Alessandro Serenelli approached her and attempted to force her into something she refused to accept. Maria resisted and cried out for help. Enraged by her refusal, Alessandro attacked her and fled, leaving the young girl gravely wounded.
Neighbors rushed her to a nearby hospital where doctors fought to save her life. Surgery was performed, but her injuries were too severe.
Maria Goretti was not a queen, a scholar, or a famous leader. She was the daughter of a poor farming family who had learned responsibility early in life after the death of her father. She cared for her younger siblings, helped her mother, and quietly lived a life shaped by faith and ordinary duties.
Yet history would remember her not for the way she lived, but for the words she spoke as she was dying.
“I forgive him, and I want him with me in Heaven.”
Years later, Alessandro Serenelli repented for what he had done, sought forgiveness, and spent the rest of his life in prayer and reflection. Finding another Maria Goretti may be rare in our time, but perhaps her story was never meant to leave us searching for another Maria. Perhaps it was meant to leave us hoping that even those who have done great wrong can still repent and change.
Let’s keep learning the saints’ way—day by day.
⌨ ᴛʸᵖⁱⁿᵍ ᴏᵘᵗ ᵒᶠ ᵗʰᵉ ʙˡᵘᵉ ᵈᵃʳᵉᵐ ᵐᵘˢⁱᶜ ᵇˡᵒᵍ
