The Priest at Prayer for August 9, Devotion to Our Lady

The Fourth Part - Some Means of Perseverence

Devotion to Our Lady

First Meditation - General Motives

I. If we reflect, even superficially, on what the Gospels tell us about Mary - and what is written down is all too little to satisfy our filial piety - we shall find sufficient motives to live perpetually and tenderly enamoured of that Holy Woman. Her admirable virtues shine through the Gospel's simple, unadorned style: such delicate acts of sovereign purity, such glorious intimacies of soul; ineffable poise, absolute self-mastery, august serenity. Blessed is the hand which bequeathed us the lines from verse 26 to 56 of the first chapter of the Gospel accord­
ing to St. Luke! The mere reading and knowledge of these lines would suffice, O Sovereign Mother of Christ, even if I knew nothing more about thee, to revere and love thee with my whole heart and soul for all eternity!

If heroicity of virtue, immaculate purity of soul, inexhaustible goodness of heart; if loftiness of aspiration, elevated dignity, and benefits showered like gentle morning dew upon mankind, are all potent to fill us with ardent devotion towards the Saints, where, O Mother of Jesus and my own dear Mother, shall I find these things so truly and so radiantly enshrined as in thee?

In venerating and loving and praising thee, I make willing obeisance to the flower of creation, to the crown of God's ineffable works and wonders. Were I to refuse thee the tribute of my love and piety, I should have to refuse it to every being that was not God, to the very heart of the woman who bore me in her womb.

II. How can I fail to greet and, both inwardly and out­wardly, express my love for her to whom one of the loftiest angelic spirits, one of the Seven in attendance at the Throne of God, the Archangel Gabriel, rendered, even before she was vested with the almost infinite: dignity of Mother of God, such astounding tokens of veneration in the name of the Almighty Himself?

Hail, full of grace, the Lord is with thee; blessed art thou among women. . . .

Fear not, Mary, thou hast found grace with God.

The Holy Ghost will come upon thee and the Power of the Most High will overshadow thee. (Luke i, 28-31.)

Has the Catholic Church or any of her most distin­guished children, however enthusiastic, fervent, and eloquent, ever gone further in Mary's praise?

All the flowers of poetry, love, art, liturgy, and all the flowers betokening imitation of thee, strewn at thy feet by twenty enamoured centuries; what are they as com­pared to this unfading, ever white and fragrant lily which the Archangel offered thee, O Mary, in the Lord's Name?

Hypocrites those who, boasting of the Christian name, reject the veneration which Catholicism of every age has rendered thee; a veneration which is but a pale reflection of that homage which thou didst receive from God's own Messenger! Will it not be lawful for the children of men to do what God Himself commanded to be done by the Hierarchy of Heaven?

III.

I have given you an example, that as I have done to you, so you do also. (John xiii, 15.)

If our lives are worth living only in so far as they reproduce the likeness of Christ, let us take Christ as our model of devotion towards Mary, His Mother.

For thirty years the Word Incarnate had no other manifest occupation than that of obeying with absolute unreserve His Blessed Mother. Now, there is no form of devotion, veneration, and love, no manifestation of piety, more deep and true than the loving submission of a child or a youth to his mother. And that, precisely, is the devotion and piety chosen by Jesus for the space of thirty years.

Will my piety, with all its inventive genius, ever attain the measure of that total self-surrender of Him Who bears the world in the palm of His hand, at Whose
summons the stars of the firmament tremblingly reply: Adsumus?

My Jesus, I thank Thee for bidding me share with Thee the filial love Thou hast for the Woman whom Thou callest "Mother".

Resolutions
First of all, can I honestly say that until now I have been truly devoted to Mary? Have I not allowed myself to be influenced by a certain type of impartial uncon­cern, regarding this attitude as the characteristic of men who rise above the devotional craze of the common people? Have I denied or disbelieved popular convictions about our Lady? Have I held aloof from the traditional practices of Marian devotion? In preaching about Mary, what has been my stimulus: personal conviction, or merely the law of supply and demand?

Therefore, I resolve to express my devotion towards Mary by the following:

1. To meditate about her more, doing with regard to her what she did to her Divine Son: "Mary treasured up all these sayings, and reflected on them in her heart." (Luke ii, 19.)

2. To have recourse to her every day by the recita­tion of the Rosary, the most popular of all prayers, and, after the liturgy, the nearest to the heart of the Church.

3. To try to imitate her, for imitation is the hallmark of sincere love and devotion; and to imitate her particu­larly in those virtues which are essentially hers and which ought to be specifically the priest's - humility, purity of body and soul, love for Christ.
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Adapted from The Priest at Prayer
by Fr. Eugenio Escribano, C.M. (© 1954)
Translated by B.T. Buckley, C.M.

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Please pray for our priests and pray for vocations to the priesthood!