stand firm, Amanda, and you will see the Holy Spirit in Person intervene to make you stronger than all the legions of Hell combined! Another martyr of the early Christian era I would like to offer as a model is St Perpetua. It is recounted, in the acts of her martyrdom with St Felicity and others, that, as part of her torment in the amphitheatre at Carthage, she was thrown into the air by a wild heifer. When she fell to the ground and realised that her tunic had been ripped, leaving her bare thigh visible, her first thought and action was to pull down her tunic in such a way as to cover her nakedness. This admirable woman thought more of Christian modesty in that hour of torture than of her excruciating pain and her imminent death. Amazingly too, she was concerned with being beautiful for the Lord, and so she asked for a pin to fasten her untidy hair, thinking it not right that a martyr should die with her hair in disorder, lest she might seem to be mourning in her hour of triumph. May St Perpetua always inspire you with her moving example of true Christian beauty and modesty! Closer to us, think of St Maria Goretti, the young Italian girl who, when ‘Christ has made my soul beautiful with the jewels of grace and virtue. I belong to Him Whom the Angels serve.’ St Agnes of Rome 95
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