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213. My dear friend, be sure that if you remain
faithful to
the interior and exterior practices of this devotion
which I
will point out, the following effects will be
produced in your
soul:
1. Knowledge of our unworthiness
By the light which the Holy Spirit will give you
through
Mary, his faithful spouse, you will perceive the
evil
inclinations of your fallen nature and how incapable
you are
of any good apart from that which God produces in
you as
Author of nature and of grace. As a consequence of
this
knowledge you will despise yourself and think of
yourself only
as an object of repugnance. You will consider
yourself as a
snail that soils everything with its slime, as a
toad that
poisons everything with its venom, as a malevolent
serpent
seeking only to deceive. Finally, the humble Virgin
Mary will
share her humility with you so that, although you
regard
yourself with distaste and desire to be disregarded
by others,
you will not look down slightingly upon anyone.
2. A share in Mary's faith
214. Mary will share her faith with you. Her faith
on earth
was stronger than that of all the patriarchs,
prophets,
apostles and saints. Now that she is reigning in
heaven she no
longer has this faith, since she sees everything
clearly in
God by the light of glory. However, with the consent
of
almighty God she did not lose it when entering
heaven. She has
preserved it for her faithful servants in the Church
militant.
Therefore the more you gain the friendship of this
noble Queen
and faithful Virgin the more you will be inspired by
faith in
your daily life. It will cause you to depend less
upon
sensible and extraordinary feelings. For it is a
lively faith
animated by love enabling you to do everything from
no other
motive than that of pure love. It is a firm faith,
unshakable
as a rock, prompting you to remain firm and
steadfast in the
midst of storms and tempests. It is an active and
probing
faith which like some mysterious pass-key admits you
into the
mysteries of Jesus Christ and of man's final destiny
and into
the very heart of God himself. It is a courageous
faith which
inspires you to undertake and carry out without
hesitation
great things for God and the salvation of souls.
Lastly, this
faith will be your flaming torch, your very life
with God,
your secret fund of divine Wisdom, and an
all-powerful weapon
for you to enlighten those who sit in darkness and
the shadow
of death. It inflames those who are lukewarm and
need the gold
of fervent love. It restores life to those who are
dead
through sin. It moves and transforms hearts of
marble and
cedars of Lebanon by gentle and convincing argument.
Finally,
this faith will strengthen you to resist the devil
and the
other enemies of salvation.
3. The gift of pure love
215. The Mother of fair love will rid your heart of
all
scruples and inordinate servile fear. She will open
and
enlarge it to obey the commandments of her Son with
alacrity
and with the holy freedom of the children of God.
She will
fill your heart with pure love of which she is the
treasury.
You will then cease to act as you did before, out of
fear of
the God who is love, but rather out of pure love.
You will
look upon him as a loving Father and endeavour to
please him
at all times. You will speak trustfully to him as a
child does
to its father. If you should have the misfortune to
offend him
you will abase yourself before him and humbly beg
his pardon.
You will offer your hand to him with simplicity and
lovingly
rise from your sin. Then, peaceful and relaxed and
buoyed up
with hope you will continue on your way to him.
4. Great confidence in God and in Mary
216. Our Blessed Lady will fill you with unbounded
confidence
in God and in herself:
- Because you will no longer approach Jesus by
yourself
but always through Mary, your loving Mother.
- Since you have given her all your merits, graces
and
satisfactions to dispose of as she pleases, she
imparts to you
her own virtues and clothes you in her own merits.
So you will
be able to say confidently to God: "Behold Mary,
your
handmaid, be it done unto me according to your
word."
- Since you have now given yourself completely to
Mary,
body and soul, she, who is generous to the generous,
and more
generous than even the kindest benefactor, will in
return give
herself to you in a marvellous but real manner.
Indeed you may
without hesitation say to her, "I am yours, O
Blessed Virgin,
obtain salvation for me," or with the beloved
disciple, St.
John, "I have taken you, Blessed Mother, for my
all." Or again
you may say with St. Bonaventure, "Dear Mother of
saving
grace, I will do everything with confidence and
without fear
because you are my strength and my boast in the
Lord," or in
another place, "I am all yours and all that I have
is yours, O
glorious Virgin, blessed above all created things.
Let me
place you as a seal upon my heart, for your love is
as strong
as death." Or adopting the sentiments of the
prophet, "Lord,
my heart has no reason to be exalted nor should my
looks be
proud; I have not sought things of great moment nor
wonders
beyond my reach; nevertheless, I am still not
humble. But I
have roused my soul and taken courage. I am as a
child, weaned
from earthly pleasures and resting on its mother's
breast. It
is upon this breast that all good things come to
me."
- What will still further increase your confidence
in
her is that, after having given her in trust all
that you
possess to use or keep as she pleases, you will
place less
trust in yourself and much more in her whom you have
made your
treasury. How comforting and how consoling when a
person can
say, "The treasury of God, where he has placed all
that he
holds most precious, is also my treasury." "She is,"
says a
saintly man, "the treasury of the Lord."
5. Communication of the spirit of Mary
217. The soul of Mary will be communicated to you to
glorify
the Lord. Her spirit will take the place of yours to
rejoice
in God, her Saviour, but only if you are faithful to
the
practices of this devotion. As St. Ambrose says,
"May the soul
of Mary be in each one of us to glorify the Lord!
May the
spirit of Mary be in each one of us to rejoice in
God!" "When
will that happy day come," asks a saintly man of our
own day
whose life was completely wrapped up in Mary, "when
God's
Mother is enthroned in men's hearts as Queen,
subjecting them
to the dominion of her great and princely Son? When
will souls
breathe Mary as the body breathes air?" When that
time comes
wonderful things will happen on earth. The Holy
Spirit,
finding his dear Spouse present again in souls, will
come down
into them with great power. He will fill them with
his gifts,
especially wisdom, by which they will produce
wonders of
grace. My dear friend, when will that happy time
come, that
age of Mary, when many souls, chosen by Mary and
given her by
the most High God, will hide themselves completely
in the
depths of her soul, becoming living copies of her,
loving and
glorifying Jesus? That day will dawn only when the
devotion I
teach is understood and put into practice. Ut
adveniat regnum
tuum, adveniat regnum Mariae: "Lord, that your
kingdom may
come, may the reign of Mary come!"
6. Transformation into the likeness of Jesus
218. If Mary, the Tree of Life, is well cultivated
in our soul
by fidelity to this devotion, she will in due time
bring forth
her fruit which is none other than Jesus. I have
seen many
devout souls searching for Jesus in one way or
another, and so
often when they have worked hard throughout the
night, all
they can say is, "Despite our having worked all
night, we have
caught nothing." To them we can say, "You have
worked hard and
gained little; Jesus can only be recognised faintly
in you."
But if we follow the immaculate path of Mary, living
the
devotion that I teach, we will always work in
daylight, we
will work in a holy place, and we will work but
little. There
is no darkness in Mary, not even the slightest
shadow since
there was never any sin in her. She is a holy place,
a holy of
holies, in which saints are formed and moulded.
219. Please note that I say that saints are moulded
in Mary.
There is a vast difference between carving a statue
by blows
of hammer and chisel and making a statue by using a
mould.
Sculptors and statue-makers work hard and need
plenty of time
to make statues by the first method. But the second
method
does not involve much work and takes very little
time. St.
Augustine speaking to our Blessed Lady says, "You
are worthy
to be called the mould of God." Mary is a mould
capable of
forming people into the image of the God-man. Anyone
who is
cast into this divine mould is quickly shaped and
moulded into
Jesus and Jesus into him. At little cost and in a
short time
he will become Christ-like since he is cast into the
very same
mould that fashioned a God-man.
220. I think I can very well compare some spiritual
directors
and devout persons to sculptors who wish to produce
Jesus in
themselves and in others by methods other than this.
Many of
them rely on their own skill, ingenuity and art and
chip away
endlessly with mallet and chisel at hard stone or
badly-prepared wood, in an effort to produce a likeness of
our Lord.
At times, they do not manage to produce a
recognisable
likeness either because they lack knowledge and
experience of
the person of Jesus or because a clumsy stroke has
spoiled the
whole work. But those who accept this little-known
secret of
grace which I offer them can rightly be compared to
smelters
and moulders who have discovered the beautiful mould
of Mary
where Jesus was so divinely and so naturally formed.
They do
not rely on their own skill but on the perfection of
the
mould. They cast and lose themselves in Mary where
they become
true models of her Son.
221. You may think this a beautiful and convincing
comparison.
But how many understand it? I would like you, my
dear friend,
to understand it. But remember that only molten and
liquefied
substances may be poured into a mould. That means
that you
must crush and melt down the old Adam in you if you
wish to
acquire the likeness of the new Adam in Mary.
7. The greater glory of Christ
222. If you live this devotion sincerely, you will
give more
glory to Jesus in a month than in many years of a
more
demanding devotion. Here are my reasons for saying
this:
1) Since you do everything through the Blessed
Virgin as
required by this devotion, you naturally lay aside
your own
intentions no matter how good they appear to you.
You abandon
yourself to our Lady's intentions even though you do
not know
what they are. Thus you share in the high quality of
her
intentions, which are so pure that she gave more
glory to God
by the smallest of her actions, say, twirling her
distaff, or
making a stitch, than did St. Laurence suffering his
cruel
martyrdom on the grid-iron, and even more than all
the saints
together in all their most heroic deeds! Mary
amassed such a
multitude of merits and graces during her sojourn on
earth
that it would be easier to count the stars in
heaven, the
drops of water in the ocean or the sands of the
sea-shore than
count her merits and graces. She thus gave more
glory to God
than all the angels and saints have given or will
ever give
him. Mary, wonder of God, when souls abandon
themselves to
you, you cannot but work wonders in them!
223. 2) In this devotion we set no store on our own
thoughts
and actions but are content to rely on Mary's
dispositions
when approaching and even speaking to Jesus. We then
act with
far greater humility than others who imperceptibly
rely on
their own dispositions and are self-satisfied about
them; and
consequently we give greater glory to God, for
perfect glory
is given to him only by the lowly and humble of
heart.
224. 3) Our Blessed Lady, in her immense love for
us, is eager
to receive into her virginal hands the gift of our
actions,
imparting to them a marvellous beauty and splendour,
and
presenting them herself to Jesus most willingly.
More glory is
given to our Lord in this way than when we make our
offering
with our own guilty hands.
225. 4) Lastly, you never think of Mary without Mary
thinking
of God for you. You never praise or honour Mary
without Mary
joining you in praising and honouring God. Mary is
entirely
relative to God. Indeed I would say that she was
relative only
to God, because she exists uniquely in reference to
him.
She is an echo of God, speaking and repeating only
God.
If you say "Mary" she says "God". When St. Elizabeth
praised
Mary calling her blessed because she had believed,
Mary, the
faithful echo of God, responded with her canticle,
"My soul
glorifies the Lord." What Mary did on that day, she
does every
day. When we praise her, when we love and honour
her, when we
present anything to her, then God is praised,
honoured and
loved and receives our gift through Mary and in
Mary.
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