You will soon see in all its splendor the great design which the Mother has upon you. You will be always my little child who does not know how to say anything or to do anything other than to remain with me, speak with me, and let yourself be used by me.
“I thank you, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, that you have hidden these things from the wise and understanding and revealed them to infants; yes, Father, for such was your gracious will.” Luke 10:21
Don’t be troubled by your littleness and be grateful for it even…just you wait and see!
305 Jesus asks for childlike abandonment to the providence of our heavenly Father who takes care of his children’s smallest needs: “Therefore do not be anxious, saying, “What shall we eat?” or “What shall we drink?”. . . Your heavenly Father knows that you need them all. But seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things shall be yours as well.”167(Catechism of the Catholic Church“
Continue to walk deprived of all assistance and in this abandonment. Do not be afraid; I myself am leading you by the hand and clasping you to my Heart. In this way, I can now make use of you as I wish, and never before as now are you the instrument chosen by me for the spread of my Movement.
Fear of abandonment can often lead us into many unsavory situations if we aren’t watchful, Our Blessed Mother is telling us, don’t fear the darkness …embrace it. And that which is truly good and permanent will come to us.
I now can see how my lengthy battle with depression turned out to be one of my biggest blessings. After having endured that, we pretty much know that with God, we can make it through anything.
So standing up for our convictions, and walking in obedience becomes that much easier. There’s momentary pain there, because in our humanness we will continue to forge attachments to our own will, but they become soluble after having gone through the fire.
We are going to need this type of perserverance for the days ahead. Follow your inner guide, not the voices of the world who seek only to steal, kill and destroy.
Continue, my son, your life of simple and filial abandonment. Live always in greatest confidence in my motherly action. Do not let yourself be caught up with things; do not become anxious. I tell you once again: no outside interference will be able to harm this work of mine.
“Trust the past God’s mercy, the present to God’s love, and the future to His providence.” –Saint Augustine
Below is an old post on my struggle with what doctors were telling me was ‘ADHD’. I now see it as merely a symptom. God has done so much for me in the area of emotional wellness, I’m so truly grateful.
You must return today to simplicity, to humility, to the confidence of little children, in order to see God. For this, I myself am preparing this cohort: my priests, whom I will cause to become littler, ever littler, so that they may be filled with the light and the love of God.
Catechism of the Catholic Church:
2546 “Blessed are the poor in spirit.”338 The Beatitudes reveal an order of happiness and grace, of beauty and peace. Jesus celebrates the joy of the poor, to whom the Kingdom already belongs:339
The Word speaks of voluntary humility as “poverty in spirit”; the Apostle gives an example of God’s poverty when he says: “For your sakes he became poor.”340
Here’s an article I wrote back in 2015. I’m constantly amazed at God’s divine plan and how it develops. I wish I had attached the FI teaching that I mentioned. 🙂
—A crown of lilies, by their purity. Oh, I know that many of these sons of mine had to undergo the violent attacks of my Adversary and that often they have fallen and that many have lost their innocence. They must not become discouraged, these sons of mine. I myself will clothe them with my purity, giving them back their innocence. My innocence will be theirs, and as the fruit of my special predilection, they will be made like me, immaculate.
2346 Charity is the form of all the virtues. Under its influence, chastity appears as a school of the gift of the person. Self-mastery is ordered to the gift of self. Chastity leads him who practices it to become a witness to his neighbor of God’s fidelity and loving kindness.
2347 The virtue of chastity blossoms in friendship. It shows the disciple how to follow and imitate him who has chosen us as his friends,134 who has given himself totally to us and allows us to participate in his divine estate. Chastity is a promise of immortality.
Chastity is expressed notably in friendship with one’s neighbor. Whether it develops between persons of the same or opposite sex, friendship represents a great good for all. It leads to spiritual communion.
The unchaste person looks to what he can get from others (whether physically or emotionally), and this is how Satan by his attacks on purity steals from us. We become incapable of being truly loving and incapable of fully serving in our mission. But it doesn’t have to end there.
2527 “The Good News of Christ continually renews the life and culture of fallen man; it combats and removes the error and evil which flow from the ever-present attraction of sin. It never ceases to purify and elevate the morality of peoples. It takes the spiritual qualities and endowments of every age and nation, and with supernatural riches it causes them to blossom, as it were, from within; it fortifies, completes, and restores them in Christ.”316 (Catechism of the Catholic Church)“
I have no need of human means. Even the little book is only a means for the spread of my Movement. It is an important means which I have chosen because it is small. It will serve to make known to many this work of my love among the priests. But to adhere to it depends entirely on correspondence to a special grace which I will grant to each one. And this you can obtain through your prayer, my son, through your love, through your suffering, and even through your inability to act. (Message to Fr. Gobbi from Our Blessed Mother)
As a Professed Lay Carmelite I’ve made many ‘consecrations to Jesus through Mary’ in my day. But it was in 2012 that a Christian brother and fellow Carmelite introduced me to the Louis DeMontfort method through his book ‘910’. I made my first Marian Consecration that year on September 8th, at the little Carmelite Chapel at the Mall where I had made my Carmelite profession. The second year, 2013 I was blessed to be in Fatima at that time for my 50th birthday. It was an amazing experience. I’ve renewed my consecration every year since then.
Fast toward to 2020… the year when the world stopped. I had heard about a new consecration book ‘Mary’s Mantle’ and was drawn to it. I started doing it and just felt compelled to just continue doing it over and over after each consecration. One of the times I even had my family join me. This took me through Lent and the remaining of the year. When I was about done with it the last time, I got an email from a friend that had been instrumental in my faith development in the past, especially through her book ‘A Mother’s Rule of Life’ and she inquired whether I knew about the Marian Movement of Priests and the Blue book. I hadn’t… so I immediately looked it up. They have the Blue Book online so I started reading it.
“The M.M.P. is not therefore an association, however praiseworthy, with a lot of statutes and directors, promoted by some Priest or fervent soul, but it is “a spirit” as the Holy Father John Paul II happily and intuitively perceived. It is something impalpable, but still strong and alive, as are the gifts of God, and has as its principal purpose the living of the consecration to the Immaculate Heart of Mary.”
Here it was, my ‘next step’. I had been doing these consecrations non stop, and it was now time to start living it! I felt elated. I later decided to check with some priests that I trusted very much, at Our Lady’s Chapel in New Bedord. I was given the name of one of their priests that has great devotion to the movement. I had felt called to that chapel towards the end of the year, when our parishes were instituting harsh Covid regulations. But it was all coming together, Our Blessed Mother had planned it all so flawlessly. I’m still in awe, and filled with gratitude for God’s Divine Providence and for all the souls He has working for His Kingdom.
Below I have linked the books that I mention above.
Let him not be troubled over the difficulties that surround him. They are allowed by God for his sanctification. Let him always pronounce his generous and total yes. This is so necessary and pleasing to me. And thus I will have him live always in my motherly heart and there he will taste such great, such very great sweetness. Oh my sons if the mother has thus kept you together for so long, it is because she has great designs upon you. I place you in the burning furnace of the heart of my son, I press you both to my own motherly heart, and I bless you. (Message to Fr. Gobbi)
This morning as I prayed with and for my husband before he set off for a job that is currently bringing him so much stress, I recounted the following story to him.
There once was a man who was asleep one night in his cabin when suddenly his room filled with light and the Savior appeared to him.
The Lord told him He had a work for him to do, and showed him a large rock explaining that he was to push against the rock with all his might. This the man did, and for many days he toiled from sunup to sundown; his shoulder set squarely against the cold massive surface of the rock, pushing with all his might. Each night the man returned to his cabin sore and worn out, feeling his whole day had been spent in vain.
Seeing that the man showed signs of discouragement, Satan decided to enter the picture – placing thoughts in the man’s mind, such as “Why kill yourself over this?, you’re never going to move it!” or “Boy, you’ve been at it a long time and you haven’t even scratched the surface!” etc. giving the man the impression the task was impossible and the man was an unworthy servant because he wasn’t moving the massive stone.
These thoughts discouraged and disheartened the man and he started to ease up in his efforts. “Why kill myself?” he thought. “I’ll just put in my time putting forth just the minimum of effort and that will be good enough.” And this he did or at least planned on doing until, one day, he decided to take his troubles to the Lord.
“Lord,” he said, “I have labored hard and long in Your service, putting forth all my strength to do that which You have asked of me. Yet after all this time, I have not even budged that rock even half a millimeter. What is wrong? Why am I failing?”
To this the Lord responded compassionately, “My friend, when long ago I asked you to serve Me and you accepted, I told you to push against the rock with all your strength and that you have done. But never once did I mention to you that I expected you to move it. At least not by yourself. Your task was to push. And now you come to Me, your strength spent, thinking that you have failed, ready to quit. But is this really so? Look at yourself. Your arms are strong and muscled; your back sinewed and brown. Your hands are calloused from constant pressure and your legs have become massive and hard. Through opposition you have grown much and your ability now far surpasses that which you used to have. Yet still, you haven’t succeeded in moving the rock; and you come to Me now with a heavy heart and your strength spent. I, my friend will move the rock. Your calling was to be obedient and push, and to exercise your faith and trust in My wisdom, and this you have done.”
_________________________________________
Today’s feast day: St. Frances of Rome:
“Gentle Holy Spirit, Saint Frances of Rome was a good wife, and yet her husband ridiculed her. I give to You all the married Christian women I know. May their faith become a great witness to their husbands. Replace arguments and division with peace and unity. Bless the husbands with a fuller understanding of Christian beliefs and the reasons behind true Christian values. Teach them to become the men You created them to be, and help the wives stand strong against worldly ways and the temptations of sin. In the same way, assist the Christian men who are married to non-believing women. Saint Frances of Rome, pray for us. Amen.”
1661 The sacrament of Matrimony signifies the union of Christ and the Church. It gives spouses the grace to love each other with the love with which Christ has loved his Church; the grace of the sacrament thus perfects the human love of the spouses, strengthens their indissoluble unity, and sanctifies them on the way to eternal life (cf Council of Trent: DS 1799). (Catechism of the Catholic Church)
At every moment I will tell you what I want of you; thus it will be I myself who will do everything in you and with you. You will always act, as it were, under my sweet motherly inspiration. And thus you will grow continually in a life united with me. My life will be your life. It will become painful and insupportable for you to live even for a moment outside of me.
I have this ‘habit’ of sometimes envisioning Mary with me at Mass. I think I may have read it somewhere and then started practicing it. The feeling is so authentic and real that the experience stays with me long after the moment has passed. When I started having this experience, she would come to me right after Holy Communion as I was still kneeling in prayer, she would drape her mantle over me and then give me her Baby to hold. It was such a sweet, Grace filled moment.
This was repeated several Sundays. She’d always cover me with her mantle first. She never told me why, actually there was never any conversation of any kind. Just an amazing moment. But I started to wonder, why the mantle… is there more to it. At that time, I started getting bombarded with articles about veiling. And it hit me. She was covering me in preparation for receiving her Son. I was hit with a feeling so strong that that’s what she wanted that I started veiling right away. Not the most comfortable of acts of obedience, especially when attending a NO Mass and no one else veils. But the Lord graced me with strength and determination and removed my self consciousness and brought my focus to worshiping Him.
That was close to a decade ago. Now fast forward to yesterday, and I had a completely different experience. Instead of sitting by my side as she had in the past; she now came within me as I was walking up the aisle to go receive Her Son. She let me glimpse the congregation with her eyes, and get a sense of how dearly she loved everyone, but there were a select few that she held particularly close because of their love and consecration to her. At that point she directed my glance to a man kneeling in prayer next to his family and I couldn’t help but smile (under my mask) at the love that poured forth.
I was also gravely aware that the love I was feeling was only a tiny minuscule of hers, because although I had gone to Confession recently and had no mortal sin in my soul, my venial sins had mounted.
So back to today… I’m reading her message to Fr. Gobbi and my soul is on fire…I have no doubt that this is true. That fleeting moment that I experienced in church is what she’s looking for from me.
For this reason you must become more and more available in my hands; let yourself be led completely by me, who have great plans. From now on you must free yourself from all other obligations… for the sake of my movement. (Message from Our Blessed Mother to Fr. Gobbi)
Freeing ourselves from all other ‘obligations’, simply means putting aside our own will. We can often get to planning and concocting and can weave such a complex situation around us causing nothing but stress, anxiety and resentment. We are being asked to just trust the plan.
41“Martha, Martha,” the Lord replied, “you are worried and upset about many things. 42But only one thing is necessary. Mary has chosen the good portion, and it will not be taken away from her.”(Luke 10:42)
Let us live the present moment in the greatest of simplicity. Whenever we feel ourselves drifting, let us make an effort to recollect ourselves. Anxiety often comes from too much preoccupation with future events, and depression from too much focus on the past. But it’s this moment, right here and right now where Grace abounds. It’s only here in the now that we can ‘pray and obey’.
Trust the past to God’s mercy, the present to God’s love and the Future to His providence. (St. Augustine)
Find Peace in a Busy World with this Easy Prayer to Our Lady of Silence to Help your Journey in Life…and Lent
Oh, beloved Mother, I come to you, tonight, Seeking for rest? To find, in silence, the serenity for which my heart thirsts? After the weariness of the day, And the fever of action,I come to you, Our Lady!
Haven of silence, Fountain of peace, Abyss of gentleness! I come to you, to renew my soul. To forget my cares, To flee from speech, And to escape from the hectic life, Of which, tonight, I am weary.
I come to you, Our Lady, Teacher of silence and of shaded retreats, Of wisdom and of joy, I come to You! I want but one thing: To remain in your sight, To think of You, Virgin of silence.And if I am too broken to think, And too weary to pray, Too wounded even to smile, To simply be there at your feet, In your silence. To savour your silence, your calm,To plunge into it, to quench my thirst in it!
To be at your feet, O Mary! To love you with all my heart, Without words, without discourses, In silence! Oh! Our Lady, I come to you? May my heart contemplate, In your silence, The silence of adoration! Amen
“Give me all the difficulties which you encounter, all the sufferings and the abandonment which you experience. Nothing comforts my Immaculate and Sorrowful heart more than a suffering which is offered to me out of love by my priest-sons.” (Message to Fr. Gobbi)
“All the difficulties that you encounter.” You don’t need to go looking for suffering, you will surely encounter it as you aim to live you’re life in full awareness of the will of God.
We often try to bypass our daily crosses by getting lost in our ‘distraction of choice’ in an attempt to numb it… sometimes this is even done without realizing it. We have laundry to do, which we tell ourselves we hate, so we find something else to completely occupy our mind and time… social media, television, snacking…whatever. You get the picture.
So you’re feeling abandoned and unloved and you think hitting up that bag of Doritos, or maybe that beer or cigar, or even perhaps the next relationship, will do it for you? It won’t…not long term anyway. Give it to Mother!!! Jesus’ Mother wants to be a mother to us too. She wants to take up all of our boo-boos, kiss them, and make them better.
By asking for our suffering, she’s not looking for us to live sad and depressed lives, quite the contrary. She wants to give us true Joy in return, the type of Joy that only comes from living in union with her Son!
