Annaleah
Annaleah (Anna Léa) is a Judean from Ophel, a working-class neighborhood of Jerusalem. "A young brunette, slender." She is barely sixteen when she becomes engaged to Samuel, but consumption is about to take her. The Apostle John, informed of the distress of his mother Eliza, intercedes for her healing with Jesus and obtains it.[1]
This experience of death leads Annaleah on a path of conversion: she wishes to make an absolute gift to her Savior.
Foreseeing the Passion of the Messiah and thinking she could not bear it, she asks Him for a Grace: to die before Him.
Her fiancé does not follow through on his intention to draw closer to God: In addition to breaking off with Annaleah under the pretext of jealousy towards her choice of virginity, he becomes an enemy of Jesus. Annaleah renews her vow of absolute virginity to the despair of her mother, who eventually resigns herself.[2]
She is soon joined by other vocations: Marianne and her sister, the two daughters of Philip the Apostle; then Myriam, the resurrected daughter of Jairus[3], and finally Sarah, a relative.[4]
Her vow is granted: she sees the triumph of Jesus entering Jerusalem on Palm Sunday[5] and dies immediately afterward.[6]
On the night of Annaleah's death, Jesus tells the Virgin Mary the news:"She died by the joy of loving (...) a supernatural joy."Both go to console the unhappy mother.[7] The resurrected Jesus will also come to comfort poor desperate Eliza, tortured by Doubt, restoring her faith:
"She is in Heaven, and she is blessed."[8]
Her name
A compound of "Anne" and "Léa" because Jesus comments on it thus: "The dear name of my grandmother and of so many other holy Women of Israel and with it, that of the good, gentle, faithful, affectionate wife of Jacob."[9]
Where is she mentioned in the work?
EMV 85 EMV 86EMV 366 EMV 367 EMV 368 EMV 370 EMV 371 EMV 376 EMV 378
EMV 509 EMV 566 EMV 581 EMV 582 EMV 583 EMV 584 EMV 590 EMV 592 EMV 596
EMV 630 EMV 632
Learn more about this character
Extracts from the Dictionary of the Gospel Characters, Salton Maria Valtorta (Mgr René Laurentin, François-Michel Debroise, Jean-François Lavère, Éditions Salvator, 2012):In ancient Greek and Roman times, consecrated celibacy was viewed negatively. The Roman Vestal Virgins are a counter-example because they were forced into that state until they were 40.The Jewish world requires a Woman to be married and have children. Sterility is considered a dishonor and a curse from God.
By contrast, from the very first Christian generation, young virgins appear: the four daughters of Philip the deacon "one of the seven"[10] and Saint Paul praises them.[11] In the early Church, virginity is quickly recognized: in the liturgies, places of honor are reserved "for the continent ones." Tertullian and Saint Ambrose dedicate treatises to them.