Notes for this theme
Reading comfort
GRM 26.7
26.7 Had I not been humble to the very extreme limit, as I told Joseph, I would not have deserved to bear within Me Him Who was lovering Himself, God, to the humiliation of being a man, in order to make reparation for the pride of the human race.
GRM 27.1
27.1 I see the house in Nazareth once again: the little room where Mary usually takes Her meals. She is now working at a white piece of cloth. She lays Her work down to light a lamp, because it is getting dark, and She can no longer see well in the greenish light which comes in through the door half open on to the orchard. She closes the door, too.
Her abdomen is now very big. But She is still so beautiful. Her walk is always agile and all Her gestures are gentle. There is none of the heavy awkward movements which are generally noticed in a woman when she is about to give birth to her child. Only Her face has changed. Now She is «the woman». Before, at the time of the Annunciation, She was a young girl with the serene innocent face of a child. Afterwards, in Elizabeth’s house, when the Baptist was born, Her face had become more refined and gracefully mature. Now it is the serene but sweetly majestic face of a woman who has reached her full perfection in maternity.
She no longer resembles the «Annunciation» of Florence, so dear to you, Father. When She was a girl, I saw the resemblance. Her face is now longer and thinner, Her eyes are more pensive and larger. In brief, it is like what Mary is now in Heaven. Because Her countenance and age are once again as they were when the Saviour was born.
Her youth is the eternal youth which not only has not known the corruption of death, but has not even experienced the withering of age. Time has not touched our Queen and Mother of the Lord Who created time; and if in Her torture at the time of Passion — a torture which had begun for Her a long time previously, I could say since Jesus began to evangelise — She looked old, such aging was like a veil cast over Her incorruptible person. In fact since the moment that She sees Jesus risen, She becomes once again the fresh perfect creature She was before such torture, as if by kissing His Most Holy Wounds She had drunk a balm of youth which cancels the action of time, and even more so, of sorrow. In fact even eight days ago, when I saw the descent of the Holy Spirit on Whitsunday, I saw that Mary was ‘beautiful, most beautiful and all of a sudden looked younger’ as I wrote and had written previously: ‘She looks like a blue angel’. Angels do not grow old. They are eternally beautiful, because they reflect the eternal youth and the eternal presence of God.
The angelical youth of Mary, blue angel, is perfected now, but not in the secrecy of a room unknown to the world and with only one archangel as witness. It reaches the perfect age which She took with Her to Heaven and which She will keep forever in Her holy glorified body, when the Spirit adorns Her with the bridal ring and crowns Her in the presence of everybody.
I wanted to make this digression because I thought that it was necessary. I will now revert to the description.
Mary, thus, is now really a «woman» full of dignity and grace. Also Her smile has gained in sweetness and majesty. How beautiful She is!
Marie's physical description
GRM 29.2-3
A thin ray of moonlight creeps in through a crack in the vault and it seems like a blade of unearthly silver looking for Mary. It stretches in length as the moon climbs higher in the sky and at last reaches Her. It is now on Her head, where it forms a halo of pure light.
Mary lifts Her head, as if She had a celestial call, and She gets up and goes onto Her knees again. Oh! How beautiful it is here now! She raises Her head, and Her face shines in the white moonlight and becomes transfigured by a supernatural smile. What does She see? What does She hear? What does She feel? She is the only one who can tell what She saw, heard and felt in the refulgent hour of Her Maternity. I can only see that the light around Her is increasing more and more. It seems to come down from Heaven, to arise from the poor things around Her, above all it seems to originate from Herself.
Her deep blue dress now seems of a pale myosotis blue, and Her hands and face are becoming clear blue as if they were placed under the glare of a huge pale sapphire. This hue is spreading more and more on the things around Her, it covers them, purifies them and brightens everything. It reminds me, although it is somewhat softer, of the hue I see in the vision of holy Paradise, and also of the colour I saw in the visit of the Wise Men.
The light is given off more and more intensely from Mary’s body, it absorbs the moonlight. She seems to be drawing to Herself all the light that can descend from Heaven. She is now the Depositary of the Light. She is to give this Light to the world. And this blissful, uncontainable, immeasurable, eternal, divine Light which is about to be given, is heralded by a dawn, a morning star, a chorus of atoms of Light that increase continuously like a tide, and rise more and more like incense, and descend like a large stream and stretch out like veils…
The vault, full of crevices, of cobwebs, of protruding rubble balanced by a miracle of physics, the dark, smoky repellant vault, now seems like the ceiling of a royal hall. Each boulder is a block of silver, each crack an opal flash, each cobweb a most precious canopy interwoven with silver and diamonds. A huge green lizard, hibernating between two stones, seems like an emerald jewel forgotten there by a queen: and a bunch of hibernating bats is like a precious onyx chandelier. The hay from the upper manger is no longer grass blades: it is pure silver wires quivering in the air with the grace of loose hair.
The dark wood of the lower manger is a block of burnished silver. The walls are covered with a brocade in which the white silk disappears under the pearly embroidery of the relief, and the soil… what is the soil now? It is a crystal lit up by a white light. Its protrusions are like roses thrown in homage of the soil; the holes are precious cups from which perfumes and scents are to arise.
29.3 And the light increases more and more. It is now unbearable to the eye. And the Virgin disappears in so much light, as if She had been absorbed by an incandescent curtain… and the Mother emerges.
Yes. When the light becomes endurable once again to my eyes, I see Mary with the new-born Son in Her arms. A little Baby, rosy and plump, bustling with His little hands as big as rose buds and kicking with His tiny feet that could be contained in the hollow of the heart of a rose: and is crying with a thin trembling voice, just like a new-born little lamb, opening His pretty little mouth that resembles a wild strawberry, and showing a tiny tongue that trembles against the rosy roof of His mouth. And He moves His little head that is so blond that it seems without any hair, a little round head that His Mummy holds in the hollow of Her hand, while She looks at Her Baby and adores Him weeping and smiling at the same time, and She bends down to kiss Him not on His innocent head, but on the centre of His chest, where underneath there is His little heart beating for us… where one day there will be the Wound. And His Mother is doctoring that wound in advance, with Her immaculate kiss.
The ox, woken up by the dazzling light, gets up with a great noise of hooves and bellows, the donkey turns its head round and brays. It is the light that rouses them but I love to think that they wanted to greet their Creator, both for themselves and on behalf of all the animals.
GRM 29.7
By refusing a human marriage in accordance with My vow of virginity, I had rejected all lustful safisfactions, thus deserving grace from God.
GRM 30.10
30.10 Jesus says:
«I will speak today. You are very tired, but have a little more patience.
It is the eve of Corpus Christi. I could speak to you about the Eucharist and the saints who became apostles of Its cult, as I spoke to you of the saints who were apostles of the Sacred Heart. But I want to speak to you of something else and of a class of worshippers of My Body who are the forerunners of Its cult. That is: the shepherds. They were the first worshippers of My Body of the Word, Who had become Man.
Once I told you and also My Church says this, the Holy Innocents are the protomartyrs of Christ. Now I tell you that the shepherds are the first worshippers of the Body of God. And they have all the qualifications to be the worshippers of My Body, o Eucharistic souls.
Firm faith: they believe the angel promptly and unquestioningly.
Generosity: they give all their wealth to their Lord.
Humility: they approach people, who from the human point of view, are poorer than they, and they do so with a modest attitude that does not humiliate them, and they profess themselves their servants.
Desire: what they are unable to offer, they endeavour to obtain by means of charitable work.
Prompt obedience: Mary wishes to inform Zacharias and Elias goes at once. He does not postpone the matter.
Love finally: they suffer in departing from the grotto and you say: ‘They leave their hearts there’. And you are right.
But should the same not happen with My Sacrament?
Maria has just seen the Adoration of the Shepherds in the manger in Bethlehem.
GRM 30.11
It is always Mary Who gives you Jesus. She is the Bearer of the Eucharist. She is the Living Pyx.
GRM 31.10
Respect for a priest is always a sign of a Christian education. Woe to those priests who lose their apostolic ardour! Also Jesus said that. But woe also to those who think that they are right in despising them! Because they consecrate and hand out the True Bread that descends from Heaven. And that contact makes them holy, just like a sacred chalice, even if they are not totally holy. They will answer to God for it. You must consider them as such and not worry about anything else. You must not be more strict than your Lord Jesus, Who, at their command, leaves Heaven and descends to be raised by their hands. You must learn from Him. And if they are blind, if they are deaf, if their souls are paralysed and their thoughts are unsound, if they are lepers full of faults in strong contrast with their mission, if they are like corpses in sepulchres, then call Jesus that He may heal them and revive them.
Call Him with your prayers, and your suffering, o victim souls. To save a soul is to predestine one’s own soul to Heaven. But to save the soul of a priest is to save a large number of souls, because every holy priest is a net that drags souls to God. And to save a priest, that is to sanctify: re-sanctify, is to create this mystical net. Each prey is a light to be added to your eternal crown.
GRM 32.7
God is Order in each Person.
GRM 32.8
‘Prompted by the Holy Spirit’ says the Gospel. Oh! If men only knew what a perfect Friend the Holy Spirit is! What Guide, what Teacher! If they only loved and invoked Him, this love of the Most Holy Trinity, this Light of Light, this Fire of Fire, this Intelligence, this Wisdom! How much more they would know of what is necessary to know!
GRM 34.14
(...) During the whole night and the following morning they prepare with the most ardent prayer their souls for the communion with the Child-God.
They do not go to that altar, which is the virginal lap holding the Divine Host, with their souls full of human worries, as you do. They forget to eat and to sleep, and if they wear the most beautiful robes, it is not for human ostentation, but to honour the King of kings. In royal palaces the dignitaries wear the most beautiful clothes. And should the Magi not go to that King in their best garments? Which greater opportunity is there for them?
Oh! In their far away countries, many a time they had to adorn themselves for men like themselves. To welcome and honour them. It is only fair, therefore, that they should prostrate purples and jewels, silks and precious feathers at the feet of the Supreme King. It is fair to put at His sweet little feet the fibres of the earth, the gems of the earth, the feathers of the earth, the metals of the earth — they are all His work — so that all these things of the earth may adore their Creator. And they would be happy if the Little Creature should order them to lie down on the ground and become a living carpet for His little baby steps, and if He trampled on them, since He left the stars to come down to them, who are but dust.
Jesus speaks of the Magi who arrived in Bethlehem by night.