To this end, I invoke the intercession of the Most Holy and Immaculate Virgin Mary, Mother of God, daring to remind her in all humility, but with consolation, of the filial devotion of my whole life, and of the desire I have always had to make her known and loved, and to spread her devotion everywhere through the ministry of those whom the Church has given to me as children, who have had the same desire as myself…
Eugene de Mazenod’s will, 1854, General Archives, Rome
Today:
Mary Immaculate is patroness of our Congregation.
Open to the Spirit, she consecrated herself totally as lowly handmaid to the person and work of the Saviour.
She received Christ in order to share him with all the world, whose hope he is. In her, we recognize the model of the Church’s faith and of our own.
We shall always look on her as our mother.
In the joys and sorrows of our missionary life, we feel close to her who is the Mother of Mercy.
Wherever our ministry takes us, we will strive to instil genuine devotion to the Immaculate Virgin who prefigures God’s final victory over all evil.
CC&RR, Constitution 10
Caryll Houselander captured this spirit when she referred to Mary as the “Reed of God” through which the music of the Incarnation took flesh. She wrote:
“It is the emptiness like the hollow in the reed…which can only have one destiny; to receive the piper’s breath and to utter the song that is in his heart.”
The words of the Constitution and Rules are “nice”, they are known and comfortable. And yet they taken on a new sense, a richness and intention that I have not previously thought of, perhaps due to haste in my reading them, or my simply not being as open to them in the way that the grace of today allows.
“She received Christ in order to share him with all the world, whose hope he is. In her, we recognize the model of the Church’s faith and of our own.” The wording is quite deliberate – she received Christ in order to share him with. I have never thought of it in quite this way before and find myself simply sitting with it. She gave herself totally to God, truly her very all in order to share him with all the world. I receive and then respond, in other words my experience is that God initiates – always – and then with grace I am able to say yes, to respond and to try to share all that I have been given, to live that out. There is here for one brief flash of a moment the temptation to turn away and say that never have I had that purity of intention, and recognizing that truth to walk away. I decide not to give into it but rather to turn towards Mary, ask for help in this. I am embarassed to even admit that such a thought is a part of me, but there it is. There is nothing I can do but to admit to this weakness, this frailty within. Is it normal, I don’t know. For sure I would feel better to know that it is, but in truth I can only say this is my littleness. All I can do is acknowledge it but not give in to it.
Mary who is the Mother of our Lord, who is the mother of mercy, who is our mother. I find myself running to her, to celebrate her and to ask at the same time to be consoled. I find myself again singing the Magnificat, slowly, quietly, with tears, wondering why I cannot celebrate with more joy.