Dear Luigi,
As I understand your original post, asking for info on the Legion, you wanted “bullet-type” notes and something of “personal experience” with the Legion of Mary rather than just the official website. The website does give excellent material, especially on our “Legion saints” and their personal experiences: Founder, Servant of God Frank Duff , Envoy to Africa, Venerable Edel Quinn, and Envoy to South America, Servant of God Alphonsus Lamb – all three Causes for Canonization are in Rome.
Let me start, however, with my "personal experience:
- I joined the “Junior Legion” in my freshman year of High School, and in my sophomore year I prayed the Act of Total Consecration to Jesus through Mary with other Legion members
- I joined the Adult Legion, after I married and we moved to our present location, and am presently a member, and current President of the Legion of Mary Praesidium, “Queen of Peace” in my parish.
It is difficult to describe the interior growth that I and others in the Legion have experienced, but I have heard and seen how much closer we have grown — closer to Jesus and the Trinity, by God’s Grace coming to us through Mary and by the power of the Holy Spirit. and closer to one another in Jesus with Mary, again by the power of the Holy Spirit. ALL Legion Meetings (from the very first meeting held on the evening of Sept. 7, 1921 - the Vigil of the Feast of Mary’s Nativity) begin with prayer to the Holy Spirit and then we pray the Rosary. This emphasis on prayer has guided us continually so that the Legion is now the largest Lay Apostolate in the world.
After prayer our Spiritual Reading is taken from the Legion Handbook written by the founder but revised to include statements from Vatican II and from our Popes and saints. Pope St. John Paul II especially, and also Pope St. John XXIII who said: “The Legion of Mary presents the True face of the Catholic Church”. Although the Handbook is the primary book used for Spiritual Reading we recently read together St. Louis DeMontfort’s treatise on “True Devotion to the Blessed Virgin Mary” since it was their reading of that book and their praying the Act of Total Consecration as St. Louis de Montfort describes, that brought the first meeting of persons together on Sept 7. They met to duscuss how they could live their consecration.
How Important to realize: prayer can be merely words if our words are not lived by God’s Grace. Prayer is a relationship with God and the fruitfulness of our prayer must be seen in the lives we live. Other replies on this thread spoke of the works done, and I might add that our reports on our Legion work, at meetings, are opportunities to share what God and Mary are enabling us to do, to let our light shine in a dark world, by bringing Jesus to others as Mary did. Pope St. John XXIII saw so well Mary is the face of the Church, and her Legion is intended by God to be like Mary.
Someone has already said, you may learn more by simply attending a meeting and seeing for yourself. True, guests are always welcome. Reading, prayerfully St. Louis De Montfort’s True Devotion see
HERE, may help. The Servant of God Frank Duff’s personal experiences may also help. There is a link at the Legion website to an article written by the Founder on his difficulties in reading True Devotion at first, but he also shares the grace he received to realize it was “True”. See
HERE.
Most important of all, is your own heartfelt prayer to the Holy Spirit to guide you. I hope this helps a bit.
I am looking for a bullet point type summary. Thanks and God bless!
