Dear Parishioners, +JMJ
There are a few books I read for meditation these days. One is called In Sinu Jesu (i.e., “In the Heart of Jesus”), a book recently published by an anonymous Benedictine monk who is still living. In this book the Benedictine monk reveals words the Lord gave him over the last decades to exhort priests to come more frequently to Jesus in Eucharistic adoration. Another book I am meditating on in very small bits every day is called, The Glories of Mary, a commentary written by St. Alphonsus Liguori about the prayer Salve Regina. The third book I am slowly reading is the Diary of St. Faustina. These last two titles topically coincided one last week.
Last week one day I went into the chapel and opened the Glories of Mary to the following:
Mary is a queen, but not the Queen of justice, punishing the guilty. She is the Queen of Mercy, full of compassion and pardon for sinners. This is why the Church makes us call her expressly “the Queen of Mercy”… St. Thomas Aquinas confirms this. He says: “When the Blessed Virgin conceived the Eternal Word in her womb and gave him birth, she obtained half the Kingdom of God. She became Queen of Mercy and her Son remained King of Justice.
After meditating a bit on this passage, I turned to the Diary of St. Faustina, and I read the following:
O Mother, Virgin, this will no one comprehend,
That the infinite God is becoming a man;
It’s only love’s and His inscrutable mercy’s purpose.
Through You, Mother – it’s given us to live with Him forever.
Oh Mary, Virgin Mother and Heaven’s Gate,
Through You salvation came to us;
Every grace to us streams forth through Your hands,
And faithful imitation of You only will sanctify me.
[I know this poem sounds a bit choppy and awkward in English, but I am sure that’s because it is a pretty slavish translation from the Polish.]
Do you think that perhaps on that day the Holy Spirit was trying to help me understand the connection between God’s mercy and the Blessed Virgin Mary? It makes sense. If the Blessed Virgin Mary is placed by God integrally into the structure of the flow of all graces – which she is, by the very fact that she bore the Son of God, and He is the source of all those graces – and Jesus’ crowning achievement by all of the grace he sends is mercy that enables our salvation, then Mary must be an amazing channel of God’s mercy. She is the Queen of Mercy!
How life changes when we allow and understand the Blessed Virgin Mary to be the channel of all of God’s grace and mercy in our lives!
Have a blessed week!
In cordibus Iesu et Mariae,
Father Poggemeyer
