The Month of Mary, According to the Spirit of St. Francis of Sales. Saint de Sales Francis
a rare and sweet odour. The holy Virgin is a thorn of that burning bush which Moses saw and which was not consumed, as the Church says: 'Rubum quem viderat Moyses incombustum, conservatam agnovimus tuam laudabilem virginitatem'. Of herself alone, she is certainly unworthy of our worship, for she is without odour. But when the great sign of reconciliation between God and men came and rested upon this holy thorn—first, by His grace in her Immaculate Conception, and afterwards at the Incarnation, when God became her Son, and reposed in her immaculate bosom—then, indeed, so great became the fragrance of this thorn that no other plant ever could produce before God so sweet and pleasing an odour. Nor will He ever reject the prayers that are perfumed in this fragrance. We repeat that all this perfume came to her from her Divine Son.
Jesus Christ is our Advocate, and so is Mary; but with what difference! In right of justice, the Saviour is alone our Advocate, because when He pleads our cause He justifies His petition by showing His Blood and His Cross. He does not hide our debts from His Father; but at the same time He urges the value of the price that He has laid down for our salvation. Mary and all the Saints exercise, also, the office of advocate in our favour; it is only by way of intercession. They entreat the Divine Justice to pardon our iniquities; but it is through the merits of the Passion of Jesus Christ. In a word, they do not add their prayers to the prayers of the Saviour, but to ours; in order to help us to obtain the graces which are necessary for our eternal salvation.
THE MONTH OF MARY.
THE IMMACULATE CONCEPTION
THE wonderful variety which is observable in the works of nature gives us a very high idea of the immeasurable riches of the Almighty Creator. And yet He manifests His power still more in the supernatural order, and the wonderful diversity of the works of grace preaches more loudly the munificence of His mercy. God, in the excess of His goodness, did not merely grant a general redemption to men, sufficient for the salvation of each one, but He diversified and multiplied the supernatural gifts which accompany this redemption with infinite liberality and wonderful variety. But His highest favours were lavished upon the most holy Virgin. From all eternity the Heavenly Father had ordained in His love to form her heart to the perfection of charity, that she might love His Divine Son with the most perfect maternal love—as He had loved Him from all eternity with the most perfect paternal love. The Son of God cast His eyes upon this Virgin, and chose her for His Mother, and co-operator in the great work of the world's redemption, a merciful Mother, a most powerful advocate of mankind—the most amiable, the most loving, and the most beloved of all creatures.
It is the opinion of many theologians that our Lord sanctified St. John the Baptist in the womb of St. Elizabeth, by a ray of His light and grace, and gave him the use of reason together with the gift of faith, so that he knew his God, hidden in the immaculate womb of Mary, adored Him, and consecrated himself to His service. If such a grace were granted by Our Lord to His precursor, who can doubt for a moment that He should have granted not only a similar, but a much greater privilege to her whom He Himself had chosen for His Mother, and that He should not only have sanctified her in the womb of her mother, St. Anne, but should have, moreover, raised her from the very first instant of her conception to a state of purity and sanctity?
The adorable Redeemer of the human race, the eternal object of the love of His Heavenly Father, considered His Mother from that first moment, as a delicious garden which was to produce the fruit of eternal life, and He cultivated this garden in order that every kind of perfection should flourish therein. He adorned her with the gold of charity and with a wondrous variety of virtues, that she might be able to sit at His side as a Queen—that is to say, occupy the first place amongst the elect, and, in this manner, enjoy the delights that are found at the right hand of the Eternal God.
This Divine Mother was redeemed, therefore, in a manner becoming the dignity of the Son, for Whom she was created. Hence she was preserved from reprobation and from all danger of it, because she was enriched with the perfection of grace and with everything necessary for its preservation. Well is she compared to a beautiful aurora, or dawn, which, from its very beginning, went on increasing until it reached its perfect day. O first-fruit of the Redemption! O masterpiece of the Redeemer! It is just, indeed, O my Divine Saviour, that as a Son full of love and devotion towards Thy Mother, in preventing her with the blessings of Heaven, Thou shouldest have preserved her, not only from sin like the Angels, but even from every danger of sinning, and shouldest, moreover, have removed from her path all that could hinder or even retard her in the exercise of Thy holy love. It was written in Thy eternal decrees that Thou wouldest at one day prefer her to all rational creatures who were dear to Thy Divine Heart, and that Thou wouldest call her the beloved object of Thy predilection, Thy dove, Thy spotless and beautiful one, perfect beyond compare.
A special privilege was reserved for Mary, worthy of a Son Who loved her with an infinite love, and Who, being infinitely good, wise and perfect, was to choose for Himself a Mother, and form her according to His own heart. He willed then that the grace of Redemption should be applied to her as a preservative remedy. Like the waters of the Jordan that, in the days of Josue, interrupted their course through respect for the Ark of the Covenant, so the stream of original corruption stayed its course at the feet of Mary, at the conception of this living tabernacle of the Eternal Covenant.
From the first instant of her conception, Mary knew her God, and loved Him sovereignly; from that moment she became impeccable, through the special assistance of the divine protection, and through the continual inflow of efficacious and preventing graces, to which she never offered the slightest resistance. God not only adorned her with the most abundant habitual grace, but He preserved it in her, keeping her always free from every evil inclination, every idle thought, and every feeling in the slightest degree contrary to the most perfect sanctity.
As to her body, we may believe it was endowed with singular perfections. St. Joachim and St. Anne received her from God through a particular, and we may say, even a miraculous grace, so that she was one of the most excellent works of the Holy Ghost, and breathed only sanctity and purity. This Queen loved, then, her virginal body, not only because it was docile, humble, pure and obedient to Divine Love, but still more because from it was formed the Body of her Saviour.
Truly has this holy Virgin been called elect as the sun, because as the sun shines resplendent above all the stars, through the excellence of its prerogatives, so there is no one amongst all the Saints who has obtained, or can ever obtain, graces superior to those bestowed upon Mary. There are Saints who have received signal graces from our Lord, and these, compared with the rest of the world, are like queens crowned with charity, and occupy a distinguished position in the love of our Divine Saviour. But His most blessed Mother is the Queen of all Queens, for she is not only crowned with charity, but with the perfection of charity, and to use an expression of the Holy Spirit, Who says that the Son is the crown of the Father; her crown is in truth her Son; that is to say, the sovereign object of charity, the Eternal Love, forms her crown.
SPIRITUAL FLOWERS.
How lovely is the rose! and yet it causes great sadness in my soul. It reminds me of my sin, on account of which the earth was condemned to produce thorns.—St. Basil.
Mary, conceived without sin, is compared to the incorruptible cedar, the scent of which puts serpents to flight.—St. Alphonsus Liguori.
How great will be our happiness in heaven, where we shall be able to contemplate Mary, to love her and be loved by her; for she alone forms a paradise of delights. Mary is truly, after God, all that is beautiful, sweet, glorious and amiable in that celestial realm; all is in Mary, all through Mary, all, in fine, is hers.—St. Bonaventure.
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