MAY, THE MONTH OF MARY (MAY 13) – MARY, INSPIRATOR OF GENEROSITY
On the night of Gethsemane, Jesus contemplated the pains that awaited him during the Passion and also saw all the iniquities of the world. How many sins to repair! His Heart remained oppressed and sweated Blood, exclaiming in pain: My soul is very sorrowful, even to death!
The outrages that Divine Goodness receives every day, even in every hour, are innumerable; Divine Justice demands reparation.
Like Veronica, who was a pearl on the road to Calvary, wiped the face of Jesus and was immediately repaid with a prodigy, so the pious souls can console Jesus and our Lady repairing for themselves and for others, offering themselves as victims of reparation.
Reparation is not a privilege of a few souls, but all the baptized have a duty, because no child must remain indifferent when the honor of the Father is outraged.
Jesus said to a privileged soul, Sister Mary of the Trinity:
“it is love that repairs, because what offends God in sin, which is the lack of love. However, when suffering is combined with love, God is given real reparation. I desire victims souls everywhere: in the world and in the cloister, in all offices, in all situations, in the fields and workshops, in schools and shops, in families, in commerce and in the arts, among the virgin and married … Yes, I request an army of victims everywhere, because evil everywhere is mixed with good.”
Our Lady, the inspirer of noble sentiments, inspires in the hearts of so many of Her devotees the desire to offer oneself generously to the life of reparation. She was tried with the great burden of intense pain on Calvary and She supported it with heroic strength. This fortitude, requested of the Virgin during Her suffering under the cross, will be granted also to the victim souls. Jesus needs those victims who repair for sins and He often chooses directly by making himself seen and heard by certain souls, who are called privileged or extraordinary victims.
To make ourselves very dear to the Blessed Virgin, let us consecrate ourselves to Jesus through Her, dedicating our lives to ordinary, simple but generous reparation.
There is the actual reparation and it consists in offering God some good work, when we realize that one commits an actual sin. When we hear a blasphemy, when we get to know of a scandal, when there is someone in the family who brings hatred … let us do acts of reparation, according to God’s own inspiration.
The habitual reparation, which is the most excellent, consists in solemnly doing, possibly with the advice of the Confessor and after a triduum or novena of preparation, the offering of all our life to God through the hands of Mary Most Holy, professing to accept with humble submission the crosses that Jesus in His goodness sends to us, intending thereby to amend the Divine Justice and to obtain the conversion of many sinners.
The Madonna prefers these ardent souls, encourages them to ever greater acts of generosity, infuses a particular strength in the trials of life and obtains from them a deep, intimate and lasting peace, to make them happy even among thorns.
That in this month of May, may many hearts consecrate themselves to God as reparative hosts!
EXAMPLE:
A good young woman, whose joy consisted in loving Jesus and Our Lady, understood that her life was precious and that it was not convenient to employ it like so many of her peers. Suffering of the many offenses against God and afflicted by the ruin of many sinful souls, she felt in her heart inflame a most magnanimous proposal. So, prostrated at the foot of the Tabernacle, she prayed: “Lord, how many sinners are without your light! If you will accept, I give you the light of my eyes; I am willing to remain blind, as long as you remain atoned of so many offenses and to convert many sinners!”
Jesus and the Virgin were pleased of the heroic offer. It did not take long and the young woman felt a gradual loss of her vision, until she became completely blind. So thus, she spent her remaining life, for more than forty years.
When the parents, unaware of her daughter’s offering, proposed to her to go to Lourdes to implore a miracle from Our Lady, the good young lady smiled … and said nothing more. Oh, how many sinners will be saved by such a victim soul!
But Jesus and his Mother did not allow themselves to be overcome in generosity. They filled that heart of so much spiritual joy, making sweet the exile of this earth. It was inspiring to look at her with her joyful smile.
If the heroism of this woman cannot be imitated, at least let us imitate her by offering many small acts of reparation to God.
A Little Spiritual Flower Offering to our Lady:
– Offer purposely, during the day, the sacrifices, contrarieties and our prayers in order to repair the sins that are being done in the world today.
Prayer to Mary:
– Holy Mother, I pray thee, to make the wounds of the Lord be imprinted in my heart!
Adapted and Translated from:
MARIA REGINA E MADRE DI MISERICORDIA (Mese di Maggio) – by DON GIUSEPPE TOMASELLI
