Week 2 - Day 7 - Seeking Knowledge of Mary

[MariaChristi]

Dear Brothers and Sisters,

Today concludes our second week in the journey toward total Consecration to Jesus through Mary. God willing, tomorrow we will begin our third and final week, seeking to understand Jesus better. No human person was closer to Jesus than Mary was or is now.

In seeking a better understanding of Mary, we have been seeking how we as human persons can give ourselves as she did. Our whole journey from the beginning has been helping us to see how we need to look to God with a singleness of purpose: “Whom do I serve? Whom shall I serve?”

We make daily choices and it seems to me, that the spirit of the world continues to tempt us all, as does our own selfishness that clings to us, and so our early days on the journey did not completely rid us of all obstacles. However, by God’s Grace, each day’s grace helped us to see more clearly Who we want to serve, and how much He loves us. On this final day of seeking a better understanding of Mary, let us again ask the Holy Spirit for all the grace we need. Let us pray the Litany of the Holy Spirit and the Ave Maris Stella, and The Most Holy Rosary with great attention and devotion.

St. Louis de Montfort encourages us with these words from his treatise, “True Devotion”:

1. …you never think of Mary without Mary thinking of God for you. You never praise or honour Mary without Mary joining you in praising and honouring God. Mary is entirely relative to God. Indeed I would say that she was relative only to God, because she exists uniquely in reference to him.

She is an echo of God, speaking and repeating only God. If you say “Mary” she says “God”. When St. Elizabeth praised Mary calling her blessed because she had believed, Mary, the faithful echo of God, responded with her canticle, “My soul glorifies the Lord.” What Mary did on that day, she does every day. When we praise her, when we love and honour her, when we present anything to her, then God is praised, honoured and loved and receives our gift through Mary and in Mary.

The Gospel for this Sunday is so appropriate for us since it stresses the necessity of prayer in our lives. Mary is the Model of prayer for the Church. Come Holy Spirit, fill the hearts of Your Faithful as You filled the heart of our Mother, Mother of our faith, of our Hope and of our Love. Enable us to grow more like her, that like her we may bring Jesus into our world so in need of Him.

 

[EIF5A]

I grew up Protestant, so sometimes, even now as a convert, I wonder to myself, “If I praise or pray to Mary too much, will I offend God by ignoring Him? Am I committing Mariolatry?”

But I had a sense in my heart that all she receives she returns back to God in greater praise and thanksgiving because of her humility. Things must happen in heaven that I cannot imagine. The rusty coins I offer to God, I hope she can polish.

And we even receive her powerful intercession in return!

But my prayers are so very feeble…

 

[MariaChristi]

I grew up Protestant, so sometimes, even now as a convert, I wonder to myself, “If I praise or pray to Mary too much, will I offend God by ignoring Him? Am I committing Mariolatry?”

But I had a sense in my heart that all she receives she returns back to God in greater praise and thanksgiving because of her humility. Things must happen in heaven that I cannot imagine. The rusty coins I offer to God, I hope she can polish.

And we even receive her powerful intercession in return!

But my prayers are so very feeble…

Dear EIF5A,

How can a Mother not love her son? How can Mary ever keep anything for herself? We “see” and “hear” her in the Gospel of Luke, as a humble servant, handmaid (some translate the original Greek word for handmaid into “slave -girl”) who only seeks to know how to cooperate with God’s plan. Her eyes are ever toward God and not herself.

You need never fear that loving His Mother will offend God who created her spotless and pure.Mary has been and ever will be pleasing to Him. When we say “Mary”, she says “God”, as St. Louis de Montfort wrote. She is the one who stood beneath the cross of Jesus and heard His words to her. She beheld the apostle John as her son and with John she beheld all of us as her children. Mary sees all of us in Jesus. We are His Body and she loves us with the purest love of a Mother – purer than we can even imagine and so filled with the Love of God – when we go to God with Mary, He is more pleased with us because of her presence.

Mary prays for us even when we are not personally praying to her. Each time she hears those words: “Holy Mary, Mother of God, pray for us sinners, now and at the hour of our death…” – whether those words are prayed by sinner or saint, she hears and prays for all of us! What a Mother Mary is for us! How grateful we need to be to God for giving her to us!

Thanks for your reply and I hope someday you will read St. Louis de Montfort’s little treatise on “True Devotion to the Blessed Virgin Mary”. An online version is HERE

 

[edlinked]

How can a Mother not love her son? How can Mary ever keep anything for herself? We “see” and “hear” her in the Gospel of Luke, as a humble servant, handmaid (some translate the original Greek word for handmaid into “slave -girl”) who only seeks to know how to cooperate with God’s plan. Her eyes are ever toward God and not herself.

Maria Christi,

I wanted to add something that I’ve always found interesting. In spanish also, the translation in the Bible of the part where Mary states she is the handmaiden of the Lord, is she is the slave of the Lord. So I liked that you made the point about some translations from Greek to slave-girl.

Then you see:
“26 But it shall not be so among you. Rather, whoever wishes to be great among you shall be your servant; 27 whoever wishes to be first among you shall be your slave. 28 Just so, the Son of Man did not come to be served but to serve and to give his life as a ransom for many.”"Matthew 20, 26-28

For me, this tells us that Mary loved God, and her closeness to Him was incomparable, in the sense that she knows that God is first.

 

[MariaChristi]

Maria Christi,

I wanted to add something that I’ve always found interesting. In spanish also, the translation in the Bible of the part where Mary states she is the handmaiden of the Lord, is she is the slave of the Lord. So I liked that you made the point about some translations from Greek to slave-girl.

Then you see:
“26 But it shall not be so among you. Rather, whoever wishes to be great among you shall be your servant; 27 whoever wishes to be first among you shall be your slave. 28 Just so, the Son of Man did not come to be served but to serve and to give his life as a ransom for many.”"Matthew 20, 26-28

For me, this tells us that Mary loved God, and her closeness to Him was incomparable, in the sense that she knows that God is first.

Yes, dear edlinked,

Mary is so filled with the Love of God that she is totally His. That is why she is Mother and Model for the Church. God desires all of us to come into that union with Him in the perfection of Charity.

In St. Louis de Montfort’s calling “True Devotion to Mary” a “holy slavery” he makes it clear that “slave” is a far better word to use because unlike a servant who can leave his master, the slave is bound to his master in a far more lasting way.

I also believe that we are imitating Jesus more perfectly because He tells us in His Holy Word that He emptied Himself taking the form of a slave and we are to have that same mind in us as was in Christ Jesus:

…Have among yourselves the same attitude that is also yours in Christ Jesus,
Who, though he was in the form of God, did not regard equality with God something to be grasped. Rather, he emptied himself, taking the form of a slave, coming in human likeness; and found human in appearance, he humbled himself, becoming obedient to death, even death on a cross.* (Philippians 2: 5-8)

Thanks so much for your reply.