The Lady Was Immaculate By Daniel A. Lord, S.J. Part 6.

ADDED LOSSES

All men and women are conscious of what St. Paul calls the “war in our members.” The pagan poet referred to this in that familiar expression: “I see the better things and approve of them, and then find that I go chasing off after the worse.” We are often amazed at ourselves: What makes us, in the midst of good resolutions, suddenly find ourselves acting like beasts? Why do we in holy places have evil thoughts? Why does the flesh lure us to stupid and criminal acts?
Why does my mind say “Do” while my senses say “Don’t?”
Why am I so easily thrown off balance? So easily upset? So quick to break my best resolutions So prone to evil?
What about all this that is called concupiscence, the concupiscence of the eye, the concupiscence of the flesh, and the pride of life?
Was man made that way?
Does God delight to see him torn apart between resolutions and failure, high ideals and low temptations?
All this is part of Original Sin. Adam and Eve were created in perfect balance. They saw things clearly. Their will was strong and firm. They could measure temptation with a just appraisal. Their flesh was under control and never rebelled against them. They were part of the perfect balance that they saw in the world around them. The stars followed the paths marked for them without erupting into fantastic forays on other stars. Nature moved in its calm and beautiful cycles. Even the animals obeyed God’s natural law. And so did Adam and Eve.
But their rebellion threw all that out of balance. It was a strange, cruel, unreasonable, illogical thing which they did
- to turn from God to the serpent, to believe the lies of the Adversary instead of the firm and beautiful promises of their Father and Creator. They did not sin out of a great, fierce temptation, coupled with hot rebellion of the flesh. They sinned almost coolly, gravely, calmly, without great pressure and in the face of sublime knowledge and great internal power.

OUR LOSS FOREVER

So it was that their minds were clouded and darkened. They had thrown their natures out of balance; their wills were sick and weakened. Concupiscence, formerly in calm control, now broke loose and caused endless trouble. They had unsettled themselves and unsettled the whole human race. And that unsettlement too came to us with Original Sin.
We find it slow to learn. We see darkly and often confusedly. We swing wildly between right or wrong, good and bad. We find ourselves ever battling with our flesh. We are unsettled, unbalanced, at war with ourselves and often at odds with the universe around us.
Had Adam been faithful, we would have known his calm and balance, clear vision and strong will. He sinned, he lost this almost automatic control of himself; and his confusion and unbalance and rebellions came down to us.
So Original Sin is really not a personal sin at all. It is an inherited loss. It is a deprivation of something God wanted me to have and Adam threw away before I even got the chance to inherit it. It is a kind of spiritual bankruptcy, a sort of susceptibility to spiritual bad health passed on from my ancestors, as material bankruptcy and bad health pass along from careless or wastrel forebears.
Original Sin shows itself in a weakness of soul and a sinister strength of rebellious flesh. It is clearly shown in my inclination to senseless and stupid and destructive ill and evil. It accounts for the fact that repulsive sin seems attractive and the Devil in a thousand disguises can trick us with apparent ease.

CHRIST WINS BACK

But in the Providence of God, things were not to stay wrecked.
What one disobedient son had ruined, an obedient Son would restore. The wreckage of the first man was to be rebuilt into order and beauty by the Greatest of the Sons of Men. Since man had destroyed, man must repair. Since a son had gone bankrupt, a Son must win back the inheritance. What Adam had thrown away in reckless prodigality, Christ would regain in labour and suffering and final death.
That is the simple Christian belief.
Christ came into the world, the perfect Son of God.
As man He was and had all that Adam had once been and possessed.
As man He would win all this back for all mankind.
But this time God would not give it freely as He had to Adam. Each man who would come to the age of reason would have to decide for himself whether he wanted to be God’s son, to inherit Heaven, to possess the divine life or grace, and to win those strengths and aids that would help him rebalance his nature.
Christ won all this on Calvary.
He gave the sacramental system to the Church, beginning with Baptism, by which men can with God’s grace take for themselves what Adam had lost, what Christ Himself possessed and won for all of us, and what God in His Providence desires us all to hold now and forever.

AS FOR MARY

We are all conceived in Original Sin.
But we all have it in our power to win back, as life progresses, the things which were lost in Original Sin. Was this the case of Mary?
Christians who thought rightly never really believed that it was. They knew that the Mother of the All-Pure must be immaculate. Since Christ was to be born as the new Adam, Mary could not be like the sinful Eve. Since He was to conquer the Adversary, how could He bear the scornful laughter of that Adversary who would cry out, “Once on a time, your Mother was in my power. The flesh that gave you birth was once inclined to evil. You are the Son of God, but once on a time, your Mother was not the daughter of God. You are the Fountain of Grace, but once at her conception your Mother was graceless. Yes, you are with her now; but there was a time when the Lord was not with her.” Such mocking laughter might well make hideous disharmony in the plans of Christ.
So Christians knew that Mary could never have been stained and soiled and tainted by Original Sin. She had to be God’s daughter always. She must ever be full of grace. The Lord would have been with her from the beginning. And her flesh could never have known the concupiscence, or her nature, the constant unbalance that is the consequence of Original Sin.
They all knew it had to be.
But how?

REASON FOR DELAY

That is why the proclamation of the dogma came so late. The Church had always believed Mary was immaculate.
The Saints called her Mary Immaculate. Theologians were sure this was true. But they had a difficulty: In point of time, Mary comes before Christ.
She was conceived and born long before He had brought about our salvation.
So since our salvation had not been won until Christ died on Calvary at the age of 33, when His Mother was at least forty-eight, how could she have been free from the guilt of Adam at the moment of her conception, almost five decades before?
Slowly they saw the explanation.
They had always been sure of the fact. Original sin in Mary? How dreadful! How out of line! How totally undignified for the Mother of the world’s Saviour.

BUT HOW?

Well, they knew that there were Saints in the days before Christ came to earth. True, when they died they did not go to Heaven, however holy they might be, not until Christ had come, died, and released them from Limbo (the Limbo of the ancients). They had been forced to remain in Limbo until our Redemption had been completed. Yet they had won back their right to Heaven; they had become adopted sons of God; they had gained grace, and the strength to balance their lives and hold their passions in check. This they had done by faith in the Messiah and the hope that He would come to save them. They had anticipated His death; and in anticipation of His death and because they believed He would come and save them, they got the grace before He actually died. They could not enter Heaven. Yet they had been saved by what He would do when His time had arrived.
So, said the theologians in a sudden burst of light, it’s really very simple:
Mary as a daughter of Adam would have been in Original Sin.
God, however, looked ahead and saw how pure and holy her life would be under any circumstances. She would have shunned temptation and lived without personal sin.
Here was someone who might well be chosen to be the Mother of the Saviour.
But the Mother of the Saviour must be protected against those evils which lie in Original Sin. She must always be the adopted daughter of God. She must always have the divine life of grace. If she is to welcome God from Heaven, she must have the right to Heaven. And God must see that she has the balance of life, the clearness of mind, the strength of character and will which befit the Perfect Mother of the Perfect Man.
So in anticipation of the death of her Son, because He would win back all that Adam had lost, God gave to Mary in advance what He gave to the people of the Old Law through their act of faith and gives to us today through Baptism and the other sacraments.
As Pius XII states in his Marian Year encyclical, the infinite dignity of Jesus Christ and His office of universal redemption is not diminished by this, but rather is greatly increased.

HAPPY TRUTH

In an age when the purity of women is so attacked and smirched, at a time when pure mothers are vitally important, when sin must be conquered at its roots, and the Adversary, now winning so much support in powerful quarters, must be completely vanquished, the Church determined to remind the world of what Christians had always believed.
The Mother of the Immaculate Christ is herself immaculate.
Of course, she never knew personal sin. She loved God too much for that.
But because she was to be the Mother of the Saviour, she was saved from taint in advance of His death. She was without touch of Original Sin from the first moment of her being. She was brought into the world with all the gifts that God had given to Eve. Never even slightly was she under the power of man’s enemy and God’s Adversary.
Mary is our pure Mother and the spotless example for womankind.
This is the meaning of the Immaculate Conception.
Could anything be more reasonable?
Could anything more completely explain the facts?
********

The Lady Was Immaculate By Daniel A. Lord, S.J. Part 5.

 

WHAT DOES IT MEAN?

What does the Church mean when it speaks of the Immaculate Conception? Of the many, many non-Catholics whom I have heard object to this teaching, not one has ever really known what it meant. They were all angry about something the Church never taught. They objected to a supposed truth which is not Catholic truth at all.

Even George Bernard Shaw, I caught explaining the Immaculate Conception as if it meant that Mary had no father.

“I violently object to your Immaculate Conception,” says my good non-Catholic friend. “Only Jesus Christ was born without a father.”

“One virgin birth is enough for Christianity,” says another, expressing the same objection slightly differently. “I believe in Christ’s Virgin Birth; I do not believe in any other.”

Now it is very important to remember that the Virgin Birth of Christ and the Immaculate Conception of Mary are two entirely different things.

Jesus had no earthly father. Mary certainly did.

Jesus was not born as the result of marital relationship between a husband and a wife. Mary was.

Jesus had one divine Father in Heaven; one human Mother on earth. Mary had a father, Joachim, and a mother, Ann.

The birth of Jesus was a miraculous thing. The birth of Mary was wholly natural.

SOMETHING FAR DIFFERENT

The fact is that most people who object to the Immaculate Conception haven’t the slightest idea of what is meant by Original Sin. And if you don’t understand Original Sin, it’s a waste of time talking about the Immaculate Conception.

The word “immaculate” is clear enough in use. It means that a person is absolutely pure, spotless, without taint or blemish, and totally filled with grace.

We speak of an immaculate or spotless reputation. In so doing we are using the word a little carelessly, but we know what we mean. We say a man has immaculate or unquestionable honesty. Here is a girl of such purity that we think of her as immaculately virgin. That is a very high compliment, and hard to merit.

Now when we speak of the Immaculate Mary, the Immaculate Virgin, the Immaculate Mother, we use the adjective correctly. We mean that she did not know sin in any way that touched herself. She did not sin in thought or word or deed or desire. She was “full of grace” in all the states of life that were hers; and “the Lord was with her” every moment of every day.

But we Catholics believe that this immaculate character of her soul was something that began the instant her soul was created. At the very instant that her parents united in their marital love and her tiny germ-like body was formed in Ann’s holy womb, the soul that came to give it life was totally free from sin.

She was immaculate the instant she was conceived. This is what we mean by the Immaculate Conception.

ADAM’S STRANGE SIN

But, the puzzled will insist, isn’t that true of everyone?

Am I suggesting that the rest of the human race is guilty of sin when the soul enters the body at conception? Is a little tiny infant, without power or will or reason or movement, capable of sinning? Isn’t this absurd? What makes Mary any different from any child of good, sound, wholesome, God-fearing parents?

To understand that we have to backtrack a bit and remember Adam and the first human sin of all.

The sin of Adam was a sin of disobedience. God had given him a simple command which was the test of his obedience and love and gratitude. Adam disobeyed God, broke the command, and sinned.

This was, of course, his own personal sin. The guilt rested on his own soul. Because of it, he was no longer God’s friend. He had lost the right to call himself the son of God. His soul was dead within him; the divine life of grace destroyed.

Thus far, except for his greater light and knowledge and strength of character and closer association with God, his sin was like all human sins. He was a disobedient son, but the world has been filled with disobedient sons. He had flouted the law of God, but so would countless millions of murderers and criminals. He had turned to the love of a woman, preferring her to the all-good, all-generous, all-loving Father, as other millions would do as long as men are men and women women. He had become the partner of Satan, God’s relentless enemy; but then, the Devil was to win the co-operation of more men than he bothered to count until they were checked in for final judgement.

This personal sin was terrible, but was not the end.

For Adam was the Father of the Human Race.

So the sin of which he was guilty, under a second aspect was called Original Sin.

ORIGINAL SIN

Sometimes we talk of Original Sin as we talk of original music or original inventions. You’d think it was something fresh and new and different and hitherto undiscovered. In a way, that is true, for this was the first sin, the start of sin, something new on the earth. Yet some of the angels had sinned through disobedience in Heaven. They had rebelled and tried to drive God out of His own kingdom. In the sense of first and fresh and new and undiscovered, this angel rebellion was the original sin.

Adam’s Original Sin means something different. It is sin at the origin of our race, It is sin of the original man. It is the sin committed by him, Adam, who is the originator of life for all the rest of mankind. It is the origin of our woes and misfortunes. It originated the great problems that were to stain the course of history and the record of human life.

To understand this a little more clearly, let’s take a comparison: Suppose that somewhere back in history you had a rich and noble ancestor. He is trusted by his country, high in the confidence of the king, honoured with titles, and rich in lands and resources. It happens to the amazement of his contemporaries and the bewilderment of historians ever since, that your ancestor turns traitor. He goes over to the side of the invader; he rebels against the country, government, and king; he takes up arms, fights with the rebels and invading forces and in the end goes down with them to defeat.

His crime of high treason is, of course, his own.

What he suffers by way of just punishment when he falls into the hands of the king and the loyal government is his own personal affair.

Unfortunately for you, however, that is not the end. He had those titles, that rank, those lands, that wealth. All are lost when he takes part in the rebellion. He was a rich man; he dies poor. He would have left you a title, the castle, his vast wealth. Actually he leaves you nothing, for he has nothing left to leave.

Today you look back regretfully and wonder why he was such a fool. People have a way of remembering you are a descendant of a famous traitor. You have none of the things he once had and tossed away in the folly of his rebellion. You may blame him; you are poorer because of his crime. Though you are not punished by the present government because of his personal crime, you actually suffer very considerably because of things you might have had but never will have because he threw them all down the drain by his crime of treasonous rebellion.

THE PARALLEL IS SIMPLE

We do not share in Adam’s and Eve’s personal sin.

That was their own crime, and for that they knew their own personal punishment.

But Original Sin is something different. It is the loss of all the precious things, those supernatural and preternatural gifts, which God had given Adam for himself and, through him, for us and which he lost in his treason and rebellion.

You see, there are certain things which God gave us that belong to our nature: our power to digest, to propagate, to walk, to use our senses; our power to think, to choose right or wrong; our immortality. This is part of our nature; and God took none of these things away from the rebellious Adam and Eve.

But in addition to these, God had given His son and daughter marvellously generous gifts. They did not properly belong to human nature but were added to it. That is why they were called Supernatural Gifts, gifts above our nature.

Man was immortal; but God added to this the promise that our immortality would be something like His own eternity. We would be happy not as mere men could be, but as God is; for we would possess Him and see and know and love Him as He sees and knows and loves and possesses Himself.

To make that possible, God adopted Adam and Eve as His children and gave them divine power which we call grace. This is a tremendous power, like the very power of God. We have no right to it by our nature; God gave it to men because He wanted them to be like Himself.

God gave Adam and Eve the right to inherit Heaven. God’s own Heaven at the end of earthly life would be theirs.

All this they lost in their treason. Had they kept these lovely and gloriously rich blessings, they would have passed them on to us their children. Once they were lost, Adam had nothing to leave us. He was poor and we were born poor.

This loss of those things which God had given to Adam and Eve is Original Sin. We are born in Original Sin because we are born without the right to Heaven, without grace which is the divine power, and without the “adoption of the sons of God.”

The Lady Was Immaculate By Daniel A. Lord, S.J. Part 4.

HER CONSENT
The Angel Gabriel knew his mission and was swiftly about it. He came because the Redemption of mankind was at hand. But as man had been responsible by disobedience, for the Fall, so a man had to be responsible by obedience for the beginnings of our restoration. A maid had unleashed upon mankind the evils of the Fall; a maid must speak the words that restored mankind to its lost heritage.
In a moment the Angel would ask her consent to mother the coming Redeemer.
His angelic eyes would have turned away from her had she been a child of sin.
Could the destroyer of sin, about to come, enter the world through a woman stained by Adam’s and Eve’s guilt?
Mary was too important for Redemption to be herself unredeemed. She was soon to mother the all pure Son of God; she dare not be herself even slightly soiled.
She was to be Mother of the Son of the Most High, Partner with the Eternal Fatherhood of God, Bride of the Holy Spirit. Could such a one be the victim of Sin, her own personal sin or sin inherited from the father of the human race?
Gabriel knew he stood before the body that was to give flesh to the stainless Redeemer of mankind. She must be pure in thought, word, will, and affection.
He was in the presence of the soul that was to envelop Christ from conception through all His formative years. She could not be, even in passing, the partner of the Devil, the Adversary, the Spirit of Evil.
Her character and cast of thought were to be passed on to her Child. She would teach Him and be the model for the long years of His human development. God would not take her for so precious and exacting a task if He found her spotted and warped and out of true balance and line.
What Gabriel saw was a woman not touched by grace, but full of it; not a girl of whom God approved, but with whom God had taken His abiding residence.
This was no ordinary saint, nor even one of the extraordinary souls selected by God for some high responsibility among men. Here was a woman filled by God with grace from on high. Here was a maid fit to be mother to the Son of the Eternal.

FARTHER BACK STILL

The story of Mary goes far, far back into history, long before we even hear her name.
It begins with the sin of a woman. Eve too had been full of grace. Because she was to be the mother of all God’s children upon earth, God had given her His love and His grace. Then in the sad flirtation of Paradise, she turned from God’s love to embrace the love of the crawling serpent, evil in its most repellent form. Her hand had led her husband to temptation and her love had lured him into sin. And as the unlucky two gazed upon the ruins of their world, they heard the rustling of the underbrush where the serpent slithered away in slimy triumph.
Dead was their inner life.
Gone was their right to call God their Father.
Already they felt within them the stirrings of vicious temptations from which they had been spared. They had used their will to choose God’s enemy in preference to Him and their will felt sick within them. All history opened before them ready to be written in blood and tears.
And they knew their guilt.
Then the voice rang out in promise. The slithering in the underbrush stopped as the voice of God brought the
Adversary to sharp halt. This time the threat was directed at him.
“I will place enmity between you and the woman, between your seed and her seed; and she shall crush your head; and you shall lie in wait for her heel.”
Falling back from his reared position in the dead leaves, Satan must have heard the words in bewilderment. The woman? what woman? He was surely not afraid of Eve. He had already won over her the easiest of victories. Was there some woman soon to come with heel destined to grind his head into the mud? As he scampered away to drop his evil disguise and to resume in hell and on the earth he had wrecked his thousand still uglier forms, Satan must have puzzled, wondered, watched, appraised every good woman who resisted him to some extent, grown a little cynical about the threatened woman, and finally become almost careless.
He probably invented for womankind the title “the weaker sex.” Eve had sorrowed, but she had not sought him out to slay him. She had wept, but she had not caused him any major anxiety. Actually she saw sin triumphing about her.
Her strong first-born, Cain, invented murder to practise it upon her dearly loved Abel. She bore her children in pain to see them reach the age of reason and turn it into the age of sinful consent. Satan soon lost all fear that Eve would be the woman, her heel finding his head.
The Jewish nation produced more than its share of notable and noble women. The Greeks and the Romans were proud of Vestal Virgins and devoted matrons. Each in turn Satan regarded with speculative eyes. Their heels never sought or by chance found him. His head they did not bloody or bow.
Sometimes we can believe that Mary was hidden away in the obscure village of Nazareth and in the tiny cottage of Ann and Joachim in a divine and effective effort to hoodwink the Adversary. Undoubtedly he was watching the palaces and the mansions. He did not dream that from pious poverty and the humble home of a royal line would come the Woman of Prophecy.
Yet Mary was the one. From her would come the Seed which descended from Abraham, the Seed that would conquer the prolific seed of Satan. Her virginal heel would rest squarely upon the head of the Adversary. He would, while she lived and once she was enthroned in Heaven, dread her with unholy hatred born of experience. Mary would never for a moment be in his power.
He would be under her heel, not she under his.
She would be neither his partner, his pawn, his victim, nor his slave.
She would bring forth the expected Seed that meant the ruin of the Adversary, Satan, the brutal enemy of God. Her otherwise gentle heel would force his head back into the depths of hell.
All this demanded untouchable purity. All this meant a woman far beyond the power or dominion of Satan. All this implied an immaculate Maid who was a spotless Mother, and who had never been other than Full of Grace and with God.

The Lady Was Immaculate By Daniel A. Lord, S.J. Part 3.

1954

The year 1954 is a highly significant year.

Because of its meaning, the Pope, Pius XII, pronounced it a Marian Year.

One hundred years ago from it, the Holy Father, Pius IX, speaking out of the power that was Peter’s, whose power had come with the voice of Christ, pronounced that belief in the Immaculate Conception of Mary was an article of Christian faith. We call it the Dogma of the Immaculate Conception.

Actually 1854, one century and more removed from us, is recent history by the standards of the Church. Christ had been dead and ascended into Heaven over eighteen hundred years. The body of revelation had been closed with the death of St. John the Evangelist eighteen centuries before.

How then did it happen that in that recent year, late in the Christian era, the Holy Father gave the world “a new dogma”? Even the word “dogma” has an unpleasant sound to many a non-Catholic ear. They forget that it simply means a Christian teaching, a revealed truth, one of God’s guideposts along the road to Heaven, a basic principle by which men can more inspiringly and effectively live, a rule of right conduct, a basis for deeper inquiry intoGod’s truth.

But “a new truth in 1854!” Isn’t this something added to Christian teaching? Isn’t it strange that at that late date Catholics are called upon to believe “something they had never believed before”?

OLD AS CHRISTIANITY AND OLDER

The fact is t hat the Dogma of the Immaculate Conception is as old as Christianity. We’ll explain it a little later, just what it means to Catholics. But now, turn instead to the first time that in Christian times the truth was declared.

The scene is a lovely little house in Nazareth where an engaged girl is busy about the kitchen of her old mother Ann and father Joachim. The leading characters are the Angel Gabriel, recently sent from the Throne of God with history’s most important message, and the young woman who was shortly to marry the village carpenter whose name was Joseph.

In the stark, detail-less mastery of essentials that characterizes the Gospel, we hear the Angel speak.

“Hail, full of grace!” he cries. “The Lord is with thee.”

Never had words, since “Let there be light” rang out from the Creative Voice of God, been so packed with meaning.

“Hail!” he cried, addressing her as one who rated the greeting of high Heaven. “Full of grace,” he called her. He did not call her “holy” or “saintly” or “my good woman!” He looked upon her with the vision of an angel and found her full of grace. More than that, at a time when the Gates of Heaven had been slammed shut by sin and God no longer dwelt with the children of men, the Angel saw that here was an exception: the Lord God was with her. Because she was full of grace, she knew the indwelling of God. And because God was with her, she was filled with grace.

THIS BEFORE CHRIST CAME

Now it is important to remember that Christ had not as yet come to redeem us. In fact, His coming hinged on a decision which this young woman would presently make. Mankind had not yet been saved. Grace was not flowing in the abundant streams that were to be released by the hands of the Saviour. It was an almost graceless world, a world without God’s intimate and affectionate presence.

Yet the Angel looked upon Mary and found her different.

She was not just a good woman, she was filled with the grace of God. She was not someone upon whom a remote God smiled in approval; the Lord of heaven and earth was with her.

Now the Jewish wise man had said gravely that the just man falls seven times a day. Mary was more than merely just; she was filled with the life and power of God which is grace. She was pleasing in the sight of the Creator Who turned away in distaste from sin and defect and evil.

In a world of sin, Mary shone like the bright Morning Star.

Her beauty of soul was the Aurora preceding the coming of the Sun of Justice. The clear vision of the Angel saw her for what she was, saw her with the vision of God Himself, and he hailed her as no creature was hailed before or since.

This was not a goddess; Christians have never claimed or thought she was. Here is a woman beloved of God.

Here is not infinity; but perfect cleanness of soul.

The Lady Was Immaculate By Daniel A. Lord, S.J. Part 2.

 

DEAR, FAMILIAR STORY

All who bother to learn the story of Mary, love it. It comes second in charm and graciousness to the story of Christ, her Son. Yet actually the two stories are so closely intertwined that the threads are often hard to distinguish. Where Mary is, Christ goes along. Where Christ goes, Mary follows Him.

The story of Mary had and retains its vivid and radiant climaxes:

The maiden of the Annunciation, dearest and best beloved figure in the whole history of painting. The swift-moving and tender nurse of Elizabeth, whose child John was born to prepare the way for her Son. The poetess of the Magnificat.

The incredibly beautiful Mother of the Nativity and the Queen of uncounted Christmas Days. The modest, humble worshipper offering her Son in the Presentation in the Temple.

The “safe conduct” that guaranteed the safety of the Holy Child in that wild and hazardous flight into Egypt. The dear companion of His Egyptian exile, and the guide of His safe return.

The loving mistress of the Holy House of Nazareth.

The successful pleader for His first miracle at Cana.

The self-obliterating watcher of His Public Life.

The heroic martyr upon Calvary.

The Mother whom He presents to mankind as a kind of final and climactic gift.

The security and centre of the frightened disciples during their wait for the coming of the Holy Spirit.

ENDLESS TRADITION

Out of the vast volumes of legend and memory, of safe tradition and exaggeratedly pious fancy, the Church had preserved the lovely facts about Mary which the Gospels do not mention. It was not likely that the early Christians would easily forget the Mother who gave them Christ and who remained after His Ascension to be the Mother of the early Church.

All the Christians have loved to recall the presentation of the Child Mary in the Temple, and the years she spent there serving the sanctuary and mastering the law and the love of God. They dwell with affection on Ann and Joachim, her parents, and the wonder of her too-long-delayed birth. They cherish her betrothal to Joseph and the day of their chaste and unselfish marriage. Saints have meditated on what a house that contained Jesus and was managed by Mary would be like and have joined their souls in meditation to that perfect household. And all Christianity from the earliest days knew that the body of Mary, which had been tabernacle to the Lord of Life, would not know captivity in the grave. The Assumption of Mary and her Coronation by her Son as Queen of Heaven is not something recent piety invented; it was being recalled when Christians spoke their glorious good news in whispers and by night within the catacombs.

MARY’S RETURNS

No generation has allowed the figure of Mary to seem a remote and distant reality. Her picture took on the features of every nation and race that painted her . . . and all of them did. Something extremely fitting suggested to Christians that they name their churches for her: if her body had housed the living presence of the Incarnate Son of God, her name seemed to fit perfectly upon the churches which retained His living Eucharistic Presence.

And lest she be for a moment forgotten, God sent her back to earth in a perfect litany of apparitions. Mary has beautifully woven together earth and Heaven by her gracious comings and goings. From Our Lady of the Pillar to Our Lady of Fatima, Catholics have found it singularly right and proper that this daughter of earth who became the Queen of Heaven would return to the sons and daughters entrusted to her by her Son on Calvary. You who do not accept Catholic Faith may not accept the visions by which Mary repeated her presence upon earth. We with the Faith would find it almost strange if she did not return. We think it the restless love of a Mother for her absent children that brings her back recurrently to their waiting hands and eyes and hearts.

Important Indeed

Candidly, we love Mary.

We love her for what she did for Christ, our Redeemer, and for the unbreakable connection she bore Him.

We love her for the dear Maid and gracious Mother she was in herself.

We are proud that the perfect Christ should have had for Mother the Perfect Woman. We are glad that the years of Christ on earth were spent in the pure, devoted, utterly unselfish companionship of earth’s most radiant yet modest, glorious yet humble, exalted yet retiring, brilliant yet (seldom and then poetically) eloquent Maid and Mother.

We think it important that God’s Son should have God’s own choice for His Mother. And we doubt that God would pick less than the best.

The Lady Was Immaculate By Daniel A. Lord, S.J. Part 1.

Statue of Our Lady of Fatima. Lucia Fatima Seer

AREN’T we fortunate? At least we can always brag that we had one perfect woman. That should be important for us of this century. We haven’t made up our mind how to treat women, and women haven’t made up their mind how they want to be treated. We don’t quite know what we want from them, and they are very confused about what they want from us.

Yes, the twentieth century has got women all mixed up. We moderns idealize them and commercialize them; we adore them and we degrade them. We demand that they lift us up and insist that they let us drag them down. We are maudlin about mothers, but we give the publicity to the childless divorcees.

Two generations ago [from 1954] a famous theatrical producer talked about “Glorifying the American Girl” and started fashions that have been pretty tough on the decent.

We make them the mistress of our purses, but we fill those same purses by using them in advertisements that must make them blush, and bait our commercial hooks with their beauty.

Today marriage is the climax of all romantic fiction and theatre; and the start of the problems of the divorce court, the soap opera, and the sessions on the psychiatrist’s couch.

One of our standard jokes, along with the mother-in-law, is the Before and After Marriage Jest.

“Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha!

Pardon the laughter!

That was before,

But this is after.”

ONE PERFECT WOMAN
Yet poets and philosophers, painters and theologians, saints and historians have a way of agreeing that we had and still have one perfect woman. “Our tainted nature’s solitary boast,” as the Protestant poet Wordsworth sang in one of literature’s most frequently quoted lines.

Strangely enough, Buddha is the world’s most reproduced male figure: more artists have carved him in stone and painted him in frescoes than any man that ever lived. But Mary is the world’s most painted woman. More women are called Mary or one of the names taken from Mary (Marian, Marion, Miriam, Marie, Marilyn, Maureen, and so on) than are named after any other woman that ever lived.

Wise Jews are proud that she comes in the long line of their distinguished Jewish women. Moslems usually speak of Jesus as the Son of Miriam. And only in very recent times, when some off-brands of Christianity thought to honour the Son by plaguing and distorting the Mother, has any Christian failed to be proud that Christianity gave the world the lovely Maid, the pure Virgin, the glorious Mother, the outstanding Heroine of all history.

IT STARTS WITH CHRIST
Catholics never forget that Mary begins with Christ.

In point of time, of course, it is the other way around. In point of importance and logic and understanding, the Mother begins with the Son.

But that is true of our whole Catholic world. Everything really begins or takes its new and true meaning from Christ.

The New World and the New Age begin with the Son of God.

He is the fulfilment and climax of one half of history, the fountain and inspiration of the other. He unites the universe as the eternal Son of God comes to earth from heaven to show us the face of the perfect God made the perfect man. Divinity glows in the star of Bethlehem, the Transfiguration on the Mount, the miracles and prophecies of a lifetime, the perfection of His character, the splendid heroism of His death, the utter wisdom of His teachings, the amazing purity of His law. His humanity is ours raised to heights which become our most challenging aspiration.

He is all-simple and all-wise;

He is all human struggle and all human power;

He is the subject of four small volumes and the study of the ages;

He is the sinless among the sinful, the brilliant among the dull, the consistent among the inconsistent, the clear among the confused, the brave among the weak, the pure among the fleshly;

He is the Carpenter who, before He handled hammer and saw and planks, had given form and law to the universe. Here is human perfection, the Perfect Man for whom philosophers had wistfully sighed. Here is our humanity at its highest, since it is divinity in humble disguise.

WHO FOR HIS MOTHER?
This is Jesus Christ, the man the world has never dared forget, however uncomfortable it finds His law. This is man, as man would be, if he truly were like God; and God, as God became, when He stooped to the level of our earthbound existence.

For this perfect man, whom could God select as mother?

For that matter, had we the selection, what kind of woman would we pick?

Certainly God would insist on a perfect mother for His perfect Son. And our sense of the fitness of things makes us give the same answer: Nothing less than feminine perfection to mother the perfect man.

Christ had for His one and only Father the all-perfect God. The mother chosen for that perfect Son by the all perfect God would in simple logic need to combine all the finest qualities we expect of motherhood, whether we mean the purity that precedes it or the absolute loyalty and gentleness, the care and tenderness that follow it.

Thus Christians (until very recent times) unanimously believed. They could not conceive a perfect Christ and a tainted Mother, an unselfish Son and a selfish, petty, irritable Dame. Like all mothers she gave Him life, was the very fountain from which His human nature took its origin; and then like all good mothers she gave Him His human education and training, her soul and heart and mind the sources of that “wisdom and age and grace” that marked His development. The Divine Nature of Christ proceeded from the Father in the mystery of the Blessed Trinity; the Human Nature was conceived by the Holy Spirit of the Mother on earth. It is inconceivable that that Mother should be other than as perfect as God’s grace and her co-operation could make her.

Devotion To The Immaculate Heart of Mary. Part 3.

Gradually, but steadily, the devotion to Mary’s Heart began to spread throughout the Church of God. In 1885, the Roman Congregation of Rites approved, but not without some modifications, the Office and Mass of the Most Pure Heart of Mary, originally composed by Saint John Eudes.

Before the religious reform of 1911, many dioceses and congregations celebrated that feast but on different days. In April, 1914, the Congregation of Rites definitely fixed the feast on the Saturday following the feast of the Sacred Heart of Jesus. To our mind, this fact again clearly shows the inseparable union that ought to exist between these two devotions. Such is the expressed wish of the Sacred Heart Himself; such also is the desire of Our Blessed Lady and of the Church of Christ, our infallible guide upon earth.

In his encyclical letter of June, 1912, Pius X requested the faithful to dedicate in an especial manner the first Saturday of every month to the Immaculate Heart of Mary. He wished that day to be a day of reparation to Mary’s Heart for the blasphemies and crimes committed against her Holy Name, and for those sins in particular against the glorious privilege of her Immaculate Conception. The first Saturday of. every month is, in the Pope’s intention, an exact parallel to the first Friday, a day of reparation and atonement to the Sacred Heart of Our Lord. To Mary’s Heart, as to that of Jesus, he asks us to return love for love; reparation for personal sins, and atonement for the sins of men. On that day, also, he has been gloriously pleased to grant a plenary indulgence to all those who recite special prayers in honour of the Immaculate Conception of Our Lady, and pray for the Pope’s intentions. From the 12th century onwards, devotion to Mary’s Immaculate Heart has certainly made wonderful progress. And in our day two very desirable events have taken place—Papal sanction for a universal feast of the Heart of Mary and the consecration of the whole human race to that spotless Heart. The Sacred Heart of Jesus now reigns supreme in the Church, for to Him these two homages have been rendered.

In 1856, Pope Pius IX established a universal feast in His honour, to be held each year on the Friday following the octave of Corpus Christi. In 1899, moreover, Pope Leo XIII solemnly consecrated mankind to the Sacred Heart of Jesus.

The Immaculate Heart of Mary now also reigns, as Queen of God’s kingdom, in the Church militant on earth. “Oportet illam regnare.”

Various movements to establish the reign of the Heart of Mary in the Church, and repeated requests to the Holy See from her devout clients have not been wanting in the past. In 1906, in the Church of Notre Dame, the then Archbishop of Paris, Cardinal Richard, consecrated repentant France to the Most Pure Heart of Mary, and put himself at the head of a movement to demand of the Pope the consecration of all the faithful to that same Heart. On the occasion of the Eucharistic Congress at Lourdes, held in July, 1914, a similar demand was submitted to His Holiness Pius X. But the hour of Providence forthe complete exaltation of Mary’s Immaculate Heart had not yet arrived. In answer to these fervent requests, the Holy Father judged it more suitable to reserve this final homage to Mary for some more favourable occasion. The Holy See has now procured for the Immaculate Heart of Mary this supreme glory, and may that final triumph of the church, foretold at the end of the 19th century, by a holy pilgrim, Charles Matte, soon arrive! “When a solemn feast in honour of the Most Pure Heart of Mary will be everywhere established, the hour of the Church’s triumph shall come.” Fiat, Fiat!

BUT Mary kept all these things pondering them in her Heart.” So little has been told us of the thoughts and words of our glorious Queen, that we prize every trace of her stay on earth, and dwell lovingly on what is preserved for us in the too brief record of the Gospels. Just as she had entered on her wonderful mission, just as she had shared the first joys and sorrows of the sacred human Heart of our God and Saviour, a revelation of her own most beautiful and holy heart allows us to penetrate into the secrets of that sanctuary during the long years to come.
The other worshippers at the manger, the other witnesses of those great mysteries (foretelling the greater mysteries to follow), went back into the busy world, where the supernatural impressions made on them might be more or less lost in the crowd of earthly cares and occupations. But the heart of the Mother treasured all “these things,” and her life henceforth was one unbroken contemplation of them, “pondering” them day by day, in deeper sympathy and deeper love.

And so, that pure, compassionate, devoted heart grew daily, holier, tenderer, more devoted still. Purer it could not be, for it was a stranger to the shadow of sin; but its holiness was heightened, its charity intensified, and its union with God perfected till all heaven gave praise to its Maker for the spiritual loveliness of the heart that was hidden in the humble cottage of Nazareth.

Not the least glorious of its gifts was the humility that saw nothing in itself that could attract the eyes of God, save the exceeding “lowliness of His Handmaid,” and not the least precious of its graces was the silence that guarded her constant meditation on the Life that was linked so closely to her own,.-the Sacred Heart Whose earthly rest and consolation were so often found in the sinless heart of His Mother.

Would that she might impart to us her sweet power of comforting that divine Heart, saddened by the ingratitude of His creatures. Would that she might mould her children’s hearts into some faint resemblance to hers-in purity, charity, patience, and self-sacrifice. Would that she might teach us what strength and wisdom and happiness we would find if we, like her, “kept all these things, pondering them” in our hearts. Not merely acknowledging the beauty and truth of the mysteries that surrounded the Incarnate Word, not merely glancing over them, or making them the subject of occasional prayer, but steeping our souls as Mary did, in the contemplation of Them, till we have learned to know our merciful Saviour so intimately that the thought is the dearest of our thoughts, the love of Him supreme in our hearts, as it was in the Immaculate Heart of Mary.

SALUTATION TO OUR LADY BY ST. JOHN EUDES.

Hail Mary, Daughter of God the Father.
Hail Mary, Mother of God the Son.
Hail Mary, Spouse of God the Holy Ghost.
Hail Mary, Temple of the undivided Divinity.
Hail Mary, fair Lily of the resplendent and ever serene Trinity.
Hail Mary, bright Rose of Heavenly beauty.
Hail Mary, Virgin of Virgins, Virgin most faithful, of whom the King of Heaven was willing to be born and to be nourished with her milk.
Hail Mary, Queen of Martyrs, whose soul was pierced with the sword of sorrow. Hail Mary, Mistress of the world, to whom is given all power in heaven and on earth. Hail Mary, Queen of my Heart, my. Mother, my life, my sweetness and my dearest hope. Hail Mary, Mother most amiable.
Hail Mary, Mother most admirable.
Hail Mary, Mother of mercy.
Hail Mary, full of grace, the Lord is with thee.
Blessed art thou amongst women, and blessed the fruit of thy Womb, Jesus. Blessed is thy spouse, Joseph.
Blessed is thy father Joachim.
Blessed is thy mother Anne.
Blessed is thy son John.
Blessed is thy angel Gabriel.
Blessed is the Eternal Father, who made choice of thee.
Blessed is the Son, who loved Thee.
Blessed is the Holy Ghost who espoused thee.
Blessed for ever are those who bless thee and love thee.
O Virgin Mary with thy loving child, bless us.
Amen.

Nihil Obstat:
W. F. O’CONNOR O.M.I
JOSEPH M. F. DANAHER, O.M.I, D. Ph., D.D., Provincialis,.
Nihil Obstat:
JACOBUS BROWNE, Censor Deputatus.
Imprimi Potest:
GULIELMUS,
Episcopus Fernensis. Die 10 Februarii, 1936.
********

Devotion To The Immaculate Heart of Mary. Part 2.

At Father Eude’s death in 1680, devotion to the Heart of Mary flourished in many of the dioceses of France. Like the grain of mustard seed, it grew and spread throughout that country until it became an important part of the liturgy. France, the eldest daughter of the Church, is certainly a land favoured by Heaven. There, the Sacred Heart of Jesus appeared in radiance and glory, asking His faithful children to make amends by their love for the ingratitude of mankind. There,. also, the Immaculate Virgin Mary revealed herself, not at Lourdes alone, but in many places and at different times. The numerous sanctuaries of Our Lady, served by the Oblates of Mary Immaculate, from the first days of the Congregation, give testimony to the many favours and blessings conferred on France by the Blessed Virgin herself. Jesus and Mary have been good to France. She was then one of the most Catholic of nations, her people loved and honoured the Sacred Heart of Jesus and the Immaculate Heart of His own Divine Mother. This twofold devotion brought down on the faithful innumerable graces and blessings. Nowhere, perhaps, have these two devotions been practised with greater fervour and intensity than at Paray-le-Monial, a place rendered famous for all time by the apparitions of the Sacred Heart to Saint Margaret Mary.

Born near Autun in 1647, this Saint had from her early childhood a tender love for the Immaculate Heart of Mary. When she entered the Visitandine convent at Paray-le-Monial, this devotion formed a large part of the spiritual life of the community, and the feast of the Heart of Mary, established in Autun by the Blessed Father Eudes, was annually celebrated there. The members of that community emulated one another in paying homage to that Heart, but St. Margaret Mary outshone them all in the intensity of her love and devotion.
In the year 1688, the Saint beheld a wonderful vision. One day, as she knelt before the tabernacle, she saw two Hearts-the Sacred Heart of Jesus and Mary-and between them a smaller one representing. her own. While she gazed with wonder upon those objects, she heard Our Lord’s voice saying to her: “It is thus that My Divine love unites those three Hearts for ever.” From that day, the holy servant of God understood that her divine Master wished her to include in her love of His Sacred Heart the love of His Mother’s spotless Heart also; that these two Hearts must be ever inseparable in her homage and devotion. That this implied wish of our loving Saviour was always carried out during her lifetime we know with certainty from the writings of her biographers. Father Gallifet S.J., for instance, writes thus:- “Sister Margaret Mary always united devotion to the Heart of Mary to her devotion to the Sacred Heart of Jesus. From her, no doubt, Father de la Colombière learned this former devotion, for he also ever united these two Hearts in his homage and love.” There were two practices, especially, by which the Saint honoured the Most Pure Heart of Mary-the frequent recitation of a litany composed by herself in honour of that Heart, and of an act of consecration which she often made at the foot of Mary’s altar; For her, as for Saint John Eudes, this devotion was an infallible and powerful means of winning the love of the Sacred Heart of Jesus Himself. To both, the motto “ Ad Cor Jesu per Cor Mariae” was dear and expressive, for they applied it to their devotion and made it the guiding principle of their lives.

After St. Margaret Mary, we find a great number of devout clients of the Sacred Heart who practised and propagated devotion to the Immaculate Heart of Mary. Holy priests, such as Fathers de la Colombière, Gallifet, Cróiset, Bouzonie and others, spent themselves, by word and work, in spreading this devotion. The Franciscans and the Jesuits of France vied with one another in making the Heart of Mary known and loved, and in endeavouring to obtain from Rome official sanction for a universal feast and office of that Most Pure Heart.
It is not astonishing, however, that during the revolutionary years of the 18th century, this devotion waned and languished in the hearts of the French people; but even in those troubled times, Divine Providence watched over it with tender care and solicitude, for pious congregations, destined to preserve and augment the devotion, were firmly established in the Church.

Father Picot de Clorivere (1820) was the founder of the Society of the Daughters of the Heart of Mary, a society whose end was, as its holy founder put it, “to make reparation to the Most Pure Heart of Mary for the many homages of which she was deprived by the suppression of religious orders, whose glory it was to have Mary as their Patroness and Mother.” Father Cordon also founded the congregation of the Sacred Hearts of Jesus and Mary, whose mission was to—awaken in the souls of the faithful the devotion so universally and so fervently practised in pre-revolutionary days. In many of the Societies founded in the 18th and 19th centuries a” Guard of Honour” was formed to make reparation to the Sacred Hearts of Jesus and Mary for the many sins and crimes of ungrateful men. The number of such Societies is too great to mention them individually,—but suffice it to say that each and every one gave glory to and increased the honour of, the Immaculate Heart of Mary.

In 1830, a miraculous event, which gave a great impetus to the devotion of which we write, took place in Paris. In that year, Our Blessed Lady appeared in a vision to a French Sister of Charity, Saint Catherine Laboure, and showed her, as a token of grace and mercy to mankind, the model of the miraculous Medal. On one side of the tableau presented to her view, the Sister saw Our Lady standing on a globe and, with out-stretched hands, pouring down graces on all mankind. On the other side, she beheld a large letter M, surmounted by a cross, and beneath it two Hearts-one, the Sacred Heart of Jesus, crowned with a circle of thorns, the other, the. Pure Heart Of Mary, pierced through and through with a sword of sorrow. The Heart of the Mother and that of the Son were bound together in the closest bonds of mutual, inexpressible sorrow; both bore the symbols of the awful suffering inflicted upon them by the sins of men. Surely this vision was a clear manifestation of Our Lady’s will. She wished thereby to convey to her loving children a two-fold message. First, that their love and devotion should include the united Hearts of the Mother and the Son; secondly, that their love should be a love of reparation; their devotion, a devotion of atonement for the sins of the world.

Six years later, in 1836, God’s desire to glorify the Immaculate Heart of Mary was manifested in a yet more striking manner. In that year a complete religious transformation took place in the parish of Our Lady of Victories in Paris, and following this, the erection of a large confraternity in honour of the Heart of Mary for the conversion of poor sinners. For a long time preceding this wonderful event, the saintly parish priest, M. Desgenettes, deplored the pitiable condition of his parish. It counted no less than 25,000 souls yet of that vast number very few indeed attended their religious duties. The sacraments were neglected, the church was practically abandoned and religion was at a very low ebb. Such a sad state of affairs must surely have caused many a pang to the heart of the saintly pastor. Yet he did not despair. Using every means in his power to bring back his erring children to God, he continued to pray to the Blessed Virgin for the conversion of his flock.

One day, in December, 1836, while he was making his thanksgiving after Mass, he distinctly heard these words pronounced “Consecrate your church and your parish to the Most Holy and Immaculate Heart of Mary.” No sooner had the voice ceased, than he consecrated himself, his parish, and his people to the Immaculate Heart of Mary, promising at the same time, that if Mary heard his prayer, he would establish in his church a confraternity in her honour. He then set to work to draw the statutes of the proposed confraternity, and on the following Sunday announced at Mass that the first meeting would take place that very evening. How great was his surprise when, on entering the church that evening, he found it almost full! Having read and explained to the people the rules of the confraternity he proposed to establish, he began to chant with them the Litany of Our Lady. When he came to the invocation “Refuge of sinners, pray for us,” an extraordinary emotion took possession of the whole assembly. Instinctively, all those in the church fell on their knees, repeating with wonderful fervour that touching invocation. On that day, the parish was saved, the confraternity of Our Lady, Refuge of Sinners, firmly established, and God’s grace reigned in the place of sin and wickedness. A complete transformation was produced in the hearts of all-a transformation which was due to the mighty power and the clement mercy of the Immaculate Heart of Mary. The Confraternity, established in such an extraordinary fashion, was instrumental in consolidating the good work begun by Our Blessed Lady herself, and in 1838, it was erected into an Archconfraternity by Pope Gregory XVI. Today it counts hundreds of thousands of associates; and hundreds of sodalities affiliated to it. Truly, as M. Desgenetes himself said: “The common Father of the faithful wishes that the Heart of His immaculate Mother be everywhere invoked in favour of poor abandoned sinners.”

Devotion To The Immaculate Heart of Mary. Part 1.

THE SEVENTEENTH CENTURY MAY BE FITLY DESCRIBED AS THE GOLDEN AGE OF THE DEVOTION TO THE PURE HEART OF MARY. UNTIL THAT TIME IT WAS PRACTISED EXCLUSIVELY BY A FEW CHOSEN SOULS, AND SPREAD ONLY BY DEGREES THROUGHOUT THE CHURCH. ASCETICAL WRITERS AND LEARNED THEOLOGIANS BEGAN TO TREAT MORE FREQUENTLY OF THIS DEVOTION. GREAT MEN, SUCH AS LOUIS DE GRENADA, CARDINAL DE BERULLE, CANISIUS, AND SUAREZ, WORKED WITH ENERGY AND ZEAL TO MAKE THIS DEVOTION BETTER KNOWN.

It was reserved for St. John Eudes to be the apostle and chief organiser of this special devotion to the Immaculate Heart of Mary. We must remark here, however, that in this holy man’s mind, the two Sacred Hearts of Jesus and Mary were ever inseparable. For almost thirty years before the revelations of Saint Margaret Mary took place, St. John had been an apostle of the devotion to the Sacred Heart of Jesus. By word and work, he had laboured to spread that devotion throughout the Church of France. Hence, in the decree of January 6th, 1903, on the heroicity of St. John Eude’s virtues, the Church herself styles him “the author of the liturgical cult of the Holy Hearts of Jesus and Mary.” As, in the divine plan, Mary prepares the way for Jesus, so also in the Church of God, devotion to the Heart of Mary prepared the way for devotion to the Sacred Heart. In St. John’s view, the ultimate object of all devotion and love is the adorable Heart of our Saviour, but, the best means of attaining that object is the Immaculate Heart of His Mother. Wherefore, he first set to work to preach and organise devotion to the Heart of Mary. And of that devotion he is the apostle par excellence, for when he began in 1641 it was scarcely known, but when he died (1680), it existed in a .flourishing condition in most of the dioceses of France. A few words, then, on St. John Eudes and his work.
Born in 1601, at Ri in the Department of Orne (France), John Eudes possessed from his tenderest years a profound love for, and a .filial devotion to, the Immaculate Mother of God. After a brilliant course of studies in the Jesuit College at Caen, he decided to enter the Congregation of the Oratory, founded by Cardinal de Berulle, and did so on March 25th, 1623. Ordained priest in 1625, Father Eudes began his sacerdotal ministry in the town of Caen. From the very beginning of his priestly career he zealously applied himself to the important work of preaching missions, and in this he was very successful.
It was not until 1641, however, that he devoted his attention to the propagation of devotion to the Heart of Mary. In that year he made the acquaintance, of a holy soul, Marie Desvalles, whom he ever afterwards regarded as a saint, favoured with divine communications and extraordinary graces. Probably, this saintly woman made known to Father Eudes the will of God with regard to the part he was to play in spreading devotion to the Pure Heart of Mary. This holy man looked upon his mission as divine, and considered himself an instrument in God’s hands for the formation of a new and distinctive devotion,and from the year 1641 the apostle of Mary’s Immaculate Heart gave himself unreservedly to the furtherance of this great project. Saint John Eudes was a Founder of religious institutes, a zealous and eloquent missionary, and a great spiritual writer. In each of these capacities, he applied all his energy and talents to his great lifework-the establishment among the faithful of France of a special devotion to the Most Pure Heart of Mary.
St. John Eudes was, first of all, a Founder of religious congregations. His first foundation on December 8th, 1641, was that of the Society of Our Lady of Charity-a Society much similar in end and constitutions to the Congregation of the Good Shepherd, of our day. Everything in that Society breathed devotion to the Pure Heart of Mary. Its very existence, in the holy Founder’s view, was due to the virginal Heart of Mary, who loved, with one and the same love , both Mary Magdalen and the Apostle, St. John. From its inception, this institute was dedicated to the chaste Heart of Our Lady. Its Founder always loved to call its members “the daughters of the Heart of Mary,” and continually invited them to seek in that Heart their rule of life, and especially their model of Christian charity. For them, moreover, he instituted the first liturgical feast of the Most Pure Heart of Mary, which was celebrated on February 8th of each year.
The Society of Jesus and Mary (the Eudists) was founded by John Eudes at Caen in 1643. He first conceived the idea of this new Society in 1641, when he was yet a member of the Oratory. In fact, it appears that he quitted this latter Congregation in order to establish the Society which now bears his name. In his intention, the Eudists were to be apostles and promoters of devotion to the Heart of Mary. He never ceased to inculcate this devotion amongst his priests, reminding them that “the Congregation is dedicated in an especial manner to the Holy Hearts of Jesus and Mary, and that they must love and honour these Hearts as their principal Patrons.” In his numerous letters to them, he frequently alluded to the same subject, and earnestly- besought them to spread his cherished devotion among the people.
The Saint’s third foundation is not a religious congregation, nor even a “Third Order” properly so called, but only an Association of holy women living in the world and practising perfect chastity. It bears the beautiful name, of the “Society of the Heart of the Mother Most Admirable.” His saintly friend,, Marie Desvalles, was the first associate of this new Society. It is still in existence, and now numbers about 25,000 associates. Probably no Society established by St. John Eudes did so much as this one for the propagation of devotion to the Heart of Mary.
But St. John was not content with spreading this devotion among his own children. He preached it also in his missions everywhere he went. From diocese to diocese, from parish to parish, this saintly priest passed, sowing, as he went, the seeds of a lasting devotion in the souls of his hearers. In the confessional as in the pulpit, the apostle of the Heart of Mary spent himself in the work of establishing his beloved devotion. To souls willing to advance in the path of perfection, he proposed the Immaculate Heart of Mary as the Model of all the virtues. To the weak and to sinners, he held it up as the sure means of salvation and perseverance. Despite Jansenistic outcries, he continued to inculcate this devotion, and eventually preached no mission or retreat without making the Sacred Hearts of Jesus and Mary known and loved. His sermons everywhere were crowned with success, for, as a result of his apostolic labours, confraternities in honour of the Most Pure Heart of Mary were established in many parishes.
At length, in 1648, he had the happiness of seeing the desire of his heart fulfilled, for the feast of the Heart of Mary was for the first time publicly celebrated at Autun. That town is remarkable not only as the place where the feast of the Most Pure Heart of Mary first appeared in the Church’s public liturgy, but also as the spot where, thirty years later, the devotion to the Sacred Heart flourished in all its perfection. Here, again, Mary prepared the way for her Son.
The hour of Providence came when St. John preached a mission in Autun, and profited by the occasion to establish a public feast in honour of Mary’s Immaculate Heart. The Mass and Office composed by himself for the feast were first approved by the Bishop of Autun, Mgs. Claude de Ragny. On February 8th, the saint celebrated the solemn Mass of the feast in the cathedral. The crowds, which thronged the sacred edifice, seemed to be set on fire with love of the Immaculate Heart of their dear Mother. Everybody united in celebrating that beautiful feast in a befitting manner, and we are told that the day was marked by a religious enthusiasm scarcely ever surpassed in that diocese.
Having established the feast at Autun, he set out to establish it in other parishes and dioceses of France. The ardent missionary let no occasion pass without obtaining for the feast and its office the approval of Bishops and theologians. In July, 1648, he preached a magnificent mission in Fere-en-Tardenois. The Pastor of that diocese, Mgr. Simon Ledgers, came in person to witness the wonderful success of the apostolic preacher, and afterwards approved the Office and Mass of the Most Pure Heart of Mary. Other Bishops followed his example, and by their sanction gave a great impetus to the devotion. By these approbations, the feast gradually made its place secure in the liturgy, and served as a potent means of spreading the new devotion among the faithful.
St. John Eude’s missionary work was the main spring of all this progress. If to these approbations and to the numerous feasts celebrated in many dioceses of France we add the confraternities established, the many altars, chapels, and churches erected, the offices, litanies and prayers composed in honour of Mary’s Immaculate Heart, we shall have a more complete idea of what the saint accomplished for this devotion.
In spite of his wonderful zeal, the apostle of the Heart of Mary was not destined to obtain complete success. The greatest desire of his heart was to obtain Papal approbation for the Feast and office. that were already approved by the Bishops of France. By this means, he hoped to make his cherished devotion known not only in his own country, but also throughout the entire Church. In 1668 he obtained the approbation of the Papal Legate in France, Cardinal de Vondome. Encouraged by this success, he endeavoured to procure the Sanction of the Congregation of Rites for the devotion. Rome, however, was slow to act, and in 1669, the answer “non expedit” (“it is not expedient”) was given. Nevertheless, he succeeded in obtaining from the reigning Pontiff, Clement IX, many privileges and indulgences for the confraternities instituted by him in honour of Mary’s Immaculate Heart. It was only in later times that this devotion obtained the proud position it now enjoys in the Catholic Church.
The third means he adopted to spread devotion to the Heart of Mary was the apostolate of the Press. A missionary and man of work, he was also one of the most remarkable of ascetical writers of the 17th century. In his letters to his spiritual sons and daughters, in his publications concerning the Mass and Office of the Heart of Mary, in his published works on that same Heart, he is once again the great apostle of this devotion. His literary endeavours contributed in no small degree to the making of this new devotion public and universal. In 1648, he wrote that’ beautiful book, “Devotion to the Most Pure Heart and to the Holy Name of the Virgin Mary.” His principal work, begun in 1663, and completed only some weeks before his death, is entitled, “The Amiable Heart of the Mother of God.” Few works, indeed, have been written on this subject; but of those that are written none surpasses, in sublimity of thought and beauty of sentiment, this last mentioned book. In it the numerous perfections and virtues of Mary’s spotless Heart are explained and glorified. In it, also, the history, theory, and practice of devotion to that Heart are clearly and solidly expounded.
We see, then, that St. John Eudes, by the societies he founded, the missions he preached, and the spiritual books he wrote, is truly “the author, doctor, and apostle of the devotion to the Pure Heart of Mary.” That title was bestowed on him by the Vicar of Christ himself, and his it shall remain for all time. After a life of merits and good works, this holy priest died in the odour of sanctity on August 19th, 1680. The fifty-five years of his sacred ministry were spent in the propagation of the devotion to the .Immaculate Heart of his Dear Mother. On January 6th, 1903, his virtues were declared heroic by the great Pope Leo XIII, and on April 11th, 1909, Pius X decreed his beatification. On earth he loved and served the Heart of his immaculate Queen; now in heaven he loves, and will love for ever, that same spotless Heart. The day came when Blessed Father Eudes was raised to the altars of the Church. He was solemnly canonized on the 31st day of May, 1925, by Pius XI, and has been proclaimed Father, Doctor, and Apostle of the Devotion to the Sacred Hearts of Jesus and Mary.

Behold Your Mother By Matthew Russell S.J. Part 2. The Immaculate Heart of Mary.

"Holiness befits Thy house, O Lord" These last words of the ninety-second psalm, which is repeated in the Divine Office almost every day of the year, refer in their primary meaning to the temple of God in Jerusalem ; but in a higher mystic sense they are applicable to the Blessed Virgin Mary. For Mary is pre-eminently the house of God. We are all of us indeed God's temples; but in a special and transcendent sense our Blessed Lady is the tabernacle of God with man, the shrine wherein God's glory dwelt. In the Incarnation, the Divinity wedded itself to our humanity, and this union was accomplished in the womb of Mary Immaculate. To no closer relations with the Infinite Creator could any creature possibly be raised than this relationship of Mother to the Man God. Not by a mere figure or metaphor, not by adoption or any external title, but in literal truth and reality, Mary is Mother of the Incarnate God of heaven and earth, for whom, according to His own word, a body was fitted— corpus aptasti mihi —out of her substance, and who drew from her veins that blood which was to wash away the sins of the whole world.

But her own soul, more perfectly than all others, was the first to be bathed in that cleansing tide. As fountains, mindful of their source, will strive to spring upward to the height from which they have come, even thus (says the great French bishop Bossuet) the river of the Precious Blood has sent its divine efficacy back to its source, the Immaculate Heart of Mary. The Immaculate Conception, therefore, is no limitation set to the conquests of the Precious Blood, but it is its earliest and completest and most glorious triumph. It is no encroachment on the empire bought by the blood of the Lamb that, by promise and acceptance, was slain from the beginning of the world. It is no exception to the universality of Christ's '' plenteous redemption '' ; it is but the first and fairest and richest of the fruits of that redemption. For the mystery of the Incarnation almost began to be virtually accomplished at the moment of the Immaculate Conception—the first instant that a human heart was beating which from its earliest throb was unutterably dear to the Son of God as the Heart of His Mother.

From its very first throb. Never for one instant did the serpent triumph over this Second Eve, this true Mother of all the living- Never for one instant was she alien to God and enslaved to sin. God could not suffer that even for a single instant, even for the swiftest lightning flash of time. His all-pure eyes should be offended with the presence of sin of any kind, or any form, in that soul for which He had waited so long, the object of His divine predilection from eternity. No, it beseemed the dignity of such a Son and of such a Mother that from the first instant of her being, the soul of the Blessed Virgin should be enriched and beautified with all graces, and preserved from the original stain by the special privilege of God's omnipotent mercy, through the merits of her Divine Son, Jesus Christ our Lord. "Fear not, Esther: this law of death is not for thee but for all others" (Esther xv. 13).

Almighty God kept the Heart of Mary immaculate, pure and stainless from the very firsts because He had chosen that Hebrew maiden to be the Mother of His Son ; and He chose her to be the Mother of His Son, out of His own infinite bounty indeed, but also because from out the abysses of His infinite wisdom He foresaw that Mary by her free use of His graces would cooperate with Him in keeping her heart such that His poor human creatures, her fellow-creatures, would at all times be able to cry to her, as we are crying now, "Most pure Heart of Mary, pray for us!''

The Heart of the Immaculate Mother is, of course, of all hearts the most like to the Heart of her Divine Son, to whom even we at His own bidding pray: "Jesus, meek and humble of heart, make my heart like to Thine/' Mary herself could have prayed that prayer during her mortal life. Nay, she did pray it, and her prayer was granted. At each successive moment of her years on earth the Heart of Mary grew more and more like to the Heart of Jesus. Out of all the fallen race of man she alone—we have said this before, but it is a delight to say it over and over— she alone, from the first throb of her heart, gave full heed to that entreaty of her Creator, " Child, give Me thy heart " (Prov. xxiii. 26). She alone, from the first throb of her heart, obeyed perfectly that first and greatest commandment, "Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with thy whole heart" She gave her whole heart to God, she loved Him with her whole heart. She never for one moment tarnished ever so slightly the sheen of heaven on her soul; and this perfect purity of heart enabled God to throw upon this speculum justitiæ, this beautiful and unspotted mirror, all the brightness of His divine grace and sanctity, as far as creature could reflect them, so that His eye might at all times, and ere time began, rest with complacency upon the Heart of Mary, before and during and after her mortal life on earth, and now this moment in the immortal life of heaven, and on and on for ever.

The first feeling that the contemplation of this mystery ought to excite in our hearts is an unselfish joy. We ought to rejoice with God that there is one perfect trophy of His redeeming grace ; one utter and absolute triumph over sin and hell; one human soul, in which the Enemy of God may never for one moment have any part so as to be able to boast that the Mother of Our Lord, the Daughter of the Eternal Father, the Spouse of the Holy Ghost, had ever been in any sense his slave; that there should be one soul at least on which the eye of God, for whom there is no past or future, might rest for ever with delight as perfectly pure and spotless.

But let us think of the Most Pure Heart of Mary, not now as the joy and glory of her Maker and Redeemer, but rather as the joy and glory of our Blessed Mother herself. And for Mary herself. Queen of Heaven and Mother of God, must not her joy of joys and her glory of glories be this perfect sinlessness—the possession, the secure and inalienable and everlasting possession, of this priceless treasure of a pure heart—purer than Alpine snows, purer than the stars, purer than the light of day ? May we not dare to say that Mary's share of the happiness of heaven— and what a share that must be !—is derived less from the glorious crown that sparkles on her brow than from the pure heart that beats within her breast ? All others that have gone up from this earth to fill the vacant thrones of heaven have been at some time, in some degree, under the ban of God's displeasure ; to her alone has He at all times said : " Thou art all fair, O my beloved, and spot there is not in thee !"

We ourselves, sinners though we be, can perceive dimly from afar how rapturous must be the glory and the ecstasy of this absolute freedom from sin. To have sinned even once is for ever to have sinned. God Himself in His almighty mercy can not undo that To have been for even the briefest term under the blight of sin is for ever to have been in time past under that deadly blight. God can forgive but He can not forget. Blessed be His mercy and His Power, that He has preserved one from the sad need of forgiveness— one on whom for all eternity He shall be able to look without being (in our human language) reminded of bygone miseries, from which only His mercy could have snatched her ! To be thus reminded of His mercies serves indeed to endear us poor sinners to Him; but a greater stretch of His mercy saved her who was to be the Mother of His Son from being ever plunged into that horrible sea of ruin wherein all other human creatures are well-nigh lost. For this greater mercy shown to the Blessed Virgin Mary, and for all the other special and singular graces reserved for her, let our souls also "magnify the Lord" and let our spirits rejoice with hers in God, her Saviour.

With this joy, however, is there not mingled a certain lurking jealousy, a selfish fear and sadness, as if all these great things which the Almighty has done for His Handmaid raised her higher and higher above us and removed her farther out of our sight ? How can she, the pure and sinless Virgin, look with love and interest on us, who are so sinful ? But she can. The tenderest and most compassionate Heart of all is His who is immaculate and impeccable, not by grace only but by nature ; and next to the Heart of Jesus the kindest and tenderest and most merciful of hearts is the Immaculate Heart of Mary.

In one of the exquisitely beautiful "Discourses to Mixed Congregations,'' which was John Henry Newman's first publication after his reception into the Church, these words occur : " It is the boast of the Catholic religion that it has the gift of making the young heart chaste ; and why is this," he asks, "but because she gives us Jesus for our food and Mary for our nursing Mother ? " Not by the young heart alone are these purifying influences needed. Hearts may remain youthful to the end in many things, good as well as evil; and hearts both young and old require to be screened against the glare of temptation and against the bewitchment of vanity—screened by the very thought of the Blessed Virgin Mary, by her prayers and patronage, and by the holy moonlight of her smile.

Yes, the mere thought of Mary's Immaculate Heart helps her poor children down below on earth to keep their hearts pure amidst the temptations and allurements of this life. Abiding habitually in her sweet and gentle presence, we learn of her to be pure of heart, as we learn of her Divine Son to be meek and humble of heart. There are, thank God, many even on earth whose presence thus purifies the very air they breathe and makes vile, earthly thoughts impossible while they are near. So in a transcendent degree with the Mother of Purity, Her of the Immaculate Heart, " the mother of fair love, of fear, of knowledge and of holy hope."

There was a good French boy many years ago, Albert de Dainville, who received as a birthday present a handsomely illustrated volume. His mother and he, turning over the pages, found that many of the pictures were unfit for Christian eyes, and they determined to destroy the book, gorgeous as was its exterior. That night after they had retired to their rooms, the lady heard her son calling her to his bedside. "Those horrid pictures are haunting me still, mother. Sit here beside me and let me hold you by the hand till I fall asleep. " Every careful and pious mother, Like this good French lady, resembles in her measure the Mother who was bequeathed to us all from the Cross; and so this simple incident has its counterpart in the life of many a child of Mary ; and we are all of us—young and old, men and women, married and single—we are all of us children of Mary.  Just in the same manner when assailed by temptation—evil thoughts or evil memories, or evil desires or dangerous company, or any other of the perils of life—we must fly to the Most Pure Heart of Mary, we must summon our Blessed Mother to our aid, imploring her to stay with us and not to let us part from her till we are safe, till all danger is past; and that will not be till life itself is past, till Mary has watched over us to the end, and we (with the names of Jesus and Mary and Joseph on our lips) have fallen asleep in peace to wake up with joy at the feet of our Immaculate Mother in heaven.

The Five First Saturdays and Reparation to The Immaculate Heart Of Mary by L. F. Harvey. Part 4

THE FIVE FIRST SATURDAYS

Now we have one thing, and that a MOST IMPORTANT THING, left, which brings us to the climax of this little work, and to the Title of our little book!

We have spent a long time in preparing for it, BECAUSE IT IS VERY IMPORTANT!
We have been speaking of Reparation, which Our Lady has so often demanded in recent years; and we have tried to make quite clear, what She has asked for.
Our Lady has asked the World for —
REPARATION TO, AND THROUGH. HER IMMACULATE HEART.
More than this, Our Lady has requested that this Reparation shall take a special form, in union with the Sacred Heart!
You see this is just what we have been saying — YOU CANNOT SEPARATE THE SACRED HEARTS.
Our Lady asked for A COMMUNION OF REPARATION ON THE FIRST SATURDAY OF EVERY MONTH.
In this way we are making reparation to Both the Sacred Hearts, and the Immaculate Heart is leading us straight to the Sacred Heart of Jesus, three to find the food and strength to nourish our souls, to give us the grace to do our duty to God and man, to lead us closer to God, and Our Lady, and to take us eventually to Heaven!
On July 13, 1917, Our Lady told the there children, in the Cova da Iria that She was coming to «ask for the consecration of Russia to My Immaculate Heart, and THE COMMUNION OF REPARATION ON THE FIRST SATURDAYS... If people attend to My requests, Russia will be converted and there WILL BE PEACE;...»

THERE WILL BE PEACE.
Have we yet a stable peace? Has Russia been converted to the Catholic Faith? God knows, and we know to our cost, that Russia has not been converted!
Many martyred Nations know that too! Millions of human slaves, of human wrecks know that too! Millions of little, broken homeless children and babies know that too! (God forgive us!) Many over burdened, heart-broken, semi-ruined tax-payers know that too !
And why is there all this hideous, unnecessary, suffering? Simply and solely because

WE HAVE NOT OBEYED OUR LADY!
Our Lady also asked us, in making our Communions on the first Saturdays of the month to make the FIVE FIRST SATURDAYS just in the same way as we make the Nine First Fridays. That is to say, we are to make the Five First Saturdays, without a break, doing three things.

The practice of the Five First Saturdays consist 1) in Making Our Confession and Communion. 2) In saying the Rosary devoutly. 3) In spending a Quarter of an hour, in meditation, on one or more of the 15 Mysteries of the Rosary, with the intention of making REPARATION !

Little Jacinta, the youngest of the three Seers of Fatima was a tower of strength to the others, and God gave her special lights to understand Our Lady's Message, baby girl though she was! After going to Hospital the little girl said to Lucy;—

«I am going to Heaven soon. You are going to stay on here to tell the people that God wants to establish in the world devotion to the Immaculate Heart of Mary. When you are going to tell them that, don't hide yourself. Tell everybody that God gives us His graces through the Immaculate Heart of Mary; that they must ask for them through Her; that the Heart of Jesus wants to be honoured, side by side, with the Immaculate Heart of Mary; that they must ask for peace through the Immaculate Heart of Mary, because God has given it into Her keeping.»

Is not all this crystal clear? Our Lady is the Queen and Giver Of PEACE!
Our Lady left, the years passed by, Francisco and Jacinta went to Heaven, and Lucy became a Nun. Then one day, eight years later, on December 10, 1925, Our, Lady appeared to Lucy once again, carrying in Her arms the Baby Jesus.
The Holy Mother showed Her Heart to Lucy, all surrounded with thorns. Then the Baby Jesus, pointing to the Suffering Heart of His Mother, said:—
«Have pity on this Heart, continually tormented by the ingratitude of men, with nobody to make Reparation!»
Oh, let us listen to, and answer, that Baby pleading! Who can refuse a baby's cry, especially when that Baby is Jesus, God of Love?
After the Infant Jesus had said this, Our Lady added:
«Look, My child, look at My Heart surrounded with thorns, with which ungrateful men pierce it, at every moment, by their blasphemies and ingratitude! Do you, at least, try to console Me; and tell everybody from Me that all, who on the First Saturday of Five consecutive months shall make their Confession and Communion, shall say the Rosary, and shall keep Me company for 15 minutes, while Meditating on the Rosary, with the intention of making Reparation, tell them from Me that I promise to help them, at the hour of their death, with all the graces necessary for the salvation of their souls.»!

Two months later, on February 15, 1926, Our Lady again appeared with the Holy Child and urged Lucy to persevere in propagating the devotion to Her Immaculate Heart, in spite of all difficulties, Lucy asked Our Lady if it was sufficient to make the Confession «during the week», when it was not possible to make it on the First Saturday. Our Lady answered «Yes», provided that the Communion was received in a state of grace, and with the intention of making the required Reparation.

Oh! What goodness of Our Lady! Oh! What Mercy of Our God! Could anybody be so MAD as to refuse that safe offer of Salvation!

REMEMBER !

CONFESSION. THE ROSARY. 15 MINUTES MEDITATION ON THE ROSARY:

ALL WITH THE INTENTION OF MAKING REPARATION, ON 5 CONSECUTIVE SATURDAYS!

With this goes the promise of Our Lady's help at death, and Eternal Life!

BUT DON'T FORGET, ALSO, A COMMUNION OF REPARATION ON EVERY FIRST SATURDAY!

Because Our Lady wishes it!
Is it not utterly inconceivable that now, 41 years after Our Lady made these requests and these staggering promises, so many, SO VERY MANY, catholics pay no attention to them?
Are we really so hard-hearted that we do not want to save MILLIONS of people from a Hell of suffering, both here and hereafter?
Are we really so hard-hearted that we do not want PEACE for the world ?
Are we really such senseless people that we do not want to make OUR HEAVEN CERTAIN?
No! No! Perhaps we have not known! Perhaps we have not thought! Perhaps, even, we have been misled by weak men, or by false prophets!
This little work, with all its faults and all its shortcomings, is written with a burning longing that all men should know Our Lady's wishes and should do their utmost to fulfil them! It is an attempt to bring right home to the hearts of all, especially of those who have not yet grasped them, Our Mother's pleadings and Our Mother's wishes, as She expressed them here on this very spot — this most holy ground!
Every single word, written here in the Cova da Iria, where Our Lady appeared just 41 years ago, is a pleading with the Holy Spirit, through the Immaculate Heart of His Most Holy Spouse, to come down upon this world in OCEANS and in CATARACTS of GRACE, to lead all men TO CONSECRATE themselves to the IMMACULATE HEART OF MARY, MOTHER OF THE ETERNAL GOD AND OUR MOTHER. It is a pleading, also, that — for their own salvation, for the salvation of others, for the Peace of the world, for the Honour and Glory of God, for the Honour of the Immaculate Heart of Mary — they will practice always the devotion of: —
THE FIVE FIRST SATURDAYS OF FIVE CONSECUTIVE MONTHS, in love of and reparation to THE IMMACULATE HEART OF MARY!

«Behold thy Mother'» «Unless you become as LITTLE CHILDREN you shall NOT ENTER into the Kingdom of Heaven»
What does a LITTLE CHILD do? A little child ALWAYS AND FIRST runs to its MOTHER, clings to its MOTHER, seeks the protection and help of its MOTHER, looks to its MOTHER for food and for everything else! Without its MOTHER a little child is lost!
Jesus has told us to look to our Mother and to act as little children do! Let us turn to Her, in Whom is «A11 the grace of the way and of truth» and all «hope of life»! Let us obey Him, by obeying Her! Then we shall be safe and we shall be saved!
«Tender arms of Mary, soft and warm and true, «All my soul is yearning in the dark for You !» (M. Kinder)

Praise be to God, to Our Lady, and to good St Joseph for another little work completed.

«Oh! Sorrowful and Immaculate Heart of Mary, pray for us who have recourse to Thee!» (300 days).