Category: Mary

How can we ever comfort Him?

Sr. Dorcee, beloved1 Comment

Today we remember the depths of Christ’s love for us.  But how can we ever love Him in return, how can we comfort Him in His suffering?  His suffering is too huge and our love is so small.  As I was pondering that question last night, the Holy Spirit called to mind something I read a year or too ago about this.  The author advised that we be like little children who try to comfort a suffering parent.  About all we can do as a child is hold our parent’s hand or kiss him or her.  Yet that provides great comfort for the parent.  All Christ asks of us is to be with Him today in His suffering, to hold His hand or kiss His feet, each in our own way.

This all reminds me of a painting by Giotto of Christ’s descent from the cross.  In it we see the women caressing Christ’s body: Mary, His dear Mother, and the women who followed Him.  Giotto places a figure square in the middle of the painting with its back to us.  He does that to prompt us to think about where we would be in the picture.  Take his prompting and let yourself enter into this mystery and hold Him and kiss Him today.

“Return to the most sorrowful woman the body, even if only lifeless, so that, although so diminished the crucified man may grow with kisses, with embraces.”

Loving with Mary

Sr. Dorcee, beloved1 Comment

This morning as I woke up, I began thinking again about contemplating our Lord’s Passion with Mary.  I was immediately struck by the thought of how much of her time and love was spent through these difficult days in loving those that Christ loved.  Peter would surely have flown to her after his denial.  How lost John must have felt after his flight in the garden.  Mary Magdalen and Mary and Martha (and Lazarus) of Bethany would have faced their own devastation.  There was the bitter anger at Judas that pervaded them all.  And so on with all of them. But just as Jesus gave her to us through John at the Cross, so He would have been urging her in the same way (by His Spirit) to go out to those He loved so much.

Perhaps your Triduum will be filled with the demands of others and you would rather be focusing more “directly” upon our Lord.  Perhaps it is His Spirit urging you to go where His Mother is going.  In following her and loving whomever she is loving, you will in fact be loving our Lord who loves them more than you do.

Contemplating with Mary

Sr. Dorcee, beloved1 Comment

There were two options for the Opening Prayer for Mass last Thursday–something I hadn’t seen yet in the new missal.  Our priest chose the second option, and I will be forever grateful.  The prayer reads:

O God, who in this season give your Church the grace to imitate devoutly the Blessed Virgin Mary in contemplating the passion of Christ, grant, we pray, through her intercession, that we may cling more firmly each day to your Only Begotten Son and come at last to the fullness of his grace.  Who lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God for ever and ever.  Amen.

I was caught by the beginning: “to imitate devoutly the Blessed Virgin Mary in contemplating the passion of Christ.”  My whole prayer became one of asking Mary to help me walk through this Holy Week close to her, perceiving her Son with her eyes and loving Him with her heart.   This, of course, can totally change one’s experience of the Passion.  Wouldn’t Mary have walked in great faith though in great darkness?  Wouldn’t she have strengthened her Son as much as she could?  Would she not have stood at the Cross in adoration, willing that He would draw from her everything that could encourage Him in doing His Father’s will completely?

May we each learn greatly from her this week.

The other book

Sr. Dorcee, beloved1 Comment

The other book I’m reading at the moment that I would like to tell you about is 33 Days to Morning Glory, A Do-It-Yourself Retreat In Preparation for Marian Consecration.  This is a book for those of you who feel an inclination to entrusting your life more to the Mother of God, but get bogged down and discouraged by books that outline long lists of prayers and readings in preparation for a consecration to Mary.  In this book, Fr. Michael E. Gaitley leads the reader in 33 days of simple readings based on the writings of Louis deMontfort, Maximilian Kolbe, Mother Teresa, and Bl. John Paul II.  This is very manageable, instructive, and inspiring.  Fr. Gaitley, as in his previous book, Consoling the Heart of Jesus, reaches out to and writes for the simple souls out there.  I am one of those, and I greatly appreciate this book.  I think many of you would as well.

Our Lady = Laser Light

Sr. Dorcee, beloved3 Comments

A Sunday poem about Our Lady:

Our Lady = Laser Light

Our Lady, Laser Beam, incredible creature held
in God’s omnipotent hand, for help of deviant, unwise man;
pure straight-line, steady, truth’s most leashed light,
love’s billions more than surface-sun concentrated fire,
sure, unwavering, non-fanning beam, heaven-homing radar-ray.

Coherent, clear, no unsimple spectrum spread,
but narrow one-wave-only burning arrow-jet
that in a single photon-packed burst of focused fire,
with a needle point annealing heals smallest rent in eyes;
light that lures dark-lurking cancers of the soul
to absorbent ruin, fuses lips of lesions and wide wounds
unites, not rough-stitching but with a mother’s gentle
hand and surgeon’s high finesse; and with no scarring pain
erases demon-traced tatoos that mar God – consecrate limbs.

Humble, immaculate beam borne by peasant Bernadettes;
yet fiery-potent force that light-explodes gloom-visaged
serpents of evil; slender, sensitive finger probing
for uncoined gold hid deep within us; mercifully wise
lens in whose clear scrutiny we see, multi-dimensional,
known and secret faces unparalleled path-finder ray
spearheading balanced tunnel through mountains of rock-doubt
and tightly-tangled fears, into the open valleys of whole air.

Final, lucent tool in God’s hand, cutting flawless-faceted
blue-brilliant Christ-diamonds, light sculptured souls of men,
Our Lady, Laser Light, inerrant, bright rod-road trajectory-less,
high-given guide-line, shortest-surest, pure light-fire path
flaming straight out, unfaltering, even to infinity …. to God.

Albert Joseph Hebert, S.M.
Mary, Our Blessed Lady
New York: Exposition Press, 1970.

Greater tenderness

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“The mystery of the Immaculate Conception allows us to understand how Mary is surrounded by the Father with greater tenderness and love than the love surrounding Eve before her sin.  Through this mercy, Mary is able to enter into a unique intimacy with the Father; she is the beloved little child, the smallest, the ‘Benjamin.’ Is one not tiny when enveloped in mercy?  Only mercy makes us small.”  (Fr. Marie-Dominique Philippe)

The wonder of God’s mercy is that this love which He has shown to Mary–his greater tenderness and love–is bequeathed to us as well through her as our Mother.  St. Thérèse confirms this: “O Jesus!  why can’t I tell all little souls how unspeakable is Your condescension?  I feel that if You found a soul weaker and littler than mine, which is impossible, You would be pleased to grant it still greater favors, provided it abandoned itself with total confidence to Your Infinite Mercy.”  And that is the key that Mary found: abandonment with total confidence to His Infinite Mercy.  Mary, sweet Mother, help us to do the same.

The Presentation of Mary

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“Listen, O daughter, give ear to my words . . . So will the King desire your beauty.” (Ps 45.11-12)

Come, all believers,
and praise her who alone is without blemish,
whom the prophets foretold,
who was brought into the temple.
From all eternity she was predestined to be Mother.
And in these last times
she has been revealed as Mother of God,
Lord by her prayers give us your peace and abundant mercy.

“We need have no fear”

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Pope Benedict’s address yesterday as he completed his visit to Germany is a word for us as well:

On Mary’s “Yes”

“In All Our Cares We Need Have No Fear, God Is Good”

FREIBURG, Germany, SEPT. 25, 2011 (Zenit.org).- Here is a Vatican translation of the address Benedict XVI delivered before praying the midday Angelus with those gathered at the Freiburg airport, and after celebrating the last public Mass of his four-day state visit to his native Germany.

* * *

Dear Sisters and Brothers!

At the end of this solemn celebration of holy Mass we now pray the Angelus together. This prayer constantly reminds us of the historical beginnings of our salvation. The Archangel Gabriel presents God’s plan of salvation to the Virgin Mary, by which she was to become the Mother of the Redeemer. Mary was fearful, but the angel of the Lord spoke a word of comfort to her: “Do not be afraid, Mary, for you have found favor with God.” So Mary is able to respond with her great “yes”. This “yes”, by which she accepts to become the handmaid of the Lord, is the trusting “yes” to God’s plan, to our salvation. And she finally addresses her “yes” to us all, whom she received as her children entrusted to her at the foot of the Cross (cf. Jn19:27). She never withdraws this promise. And so she is called happy, or rather blessed, for believing that what was promised her by the Lord would be fulfilled (cf. Lk 1:45).

As we pray this Angelus, we may join Mary in her “yes”, we may adhere trustingly to the beauty of God’s plan and to the providence that he has assigned to us in his grace. Then God’s love will also, as it were, take flesh in our lives, becoming ever more tangible. In all our cares we need have no fear.

Birth of Mary

Sr. Dorcee, beloved1 Comment

A repost:

Today we celebrate the birth of Mary.  I have to say that this morning when I woke up, I felt like breaking into a little song to her, at least “Happy birthday to you . . .”–which sounds so trite–but I knew in my heart that that would be dear to her . . . because she is that kind of Mother.

I want to share the first verse of a poem by Rilke because I think it conveys the sense of joy in the heavens at the birth of this great gift of God to us.

Birth of Mary

O what must it have cost the angels
not suddenly to burst into song, as one bursts into tears,
since indeed they knew: on this night the mother is being
born to the boy, the One, who shall soon appear.

(Rainer Maria Rilke, translated from the German by M.D. Herter Norton)

Remembering all that God has done for us

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Pope Benedict XVI has been giving a series of talks on prayer recently in his Wednesday audiences.  I am including an excerpt below from August 17 in which he spoke about Mary as a model for us of a woman who truly pondered God in all things.  (If you are interested in hearing a talk that I gave recently on remembering God throughout the day, go to the Talks tab above.  Click on “Other Talks” and then on “A Thousand Times a Day.”)  Continue reading “Remembering all that God has done for us” →