Sunday After The Octave Of The Assumption

The Heart Of Mary

Preparation. - As all good proceeds from the heart, we shall study the Heart of Mary, and for this purpose we shall consider, first, the holy dispositions of that generous Heart, and secondly, its immense love for God. Following the counsel of the Holy Ghost, we shall resolve to watch without ceasing over our interior, our thoughts, desires and affections, in order to turn them towards God and attach them to Him alone. “With all watchfulness keep thy heart, because life issueth out from it” (Prov. 4. 23).

I. The Dispositions Of Mary’s Heart

Humility, purity, devotion and fidelity, says St. Albert, the Carmelite, are the four qualities of a good heart. Who can tell us in how great a degree the Immaculate Virgin possessed these precious qualities. By the vivid lights with which she was forestalled from her very Conception, she already knew, better than all the saints together, the grandeurs of God and her own nothingness. Her Heart was then engulfed in the ocean of the divine perfections as an atom in boundless space. Being profoundly abased before the infinite majesty of God, it rendered all glory to Him, and accepted beforehand every confusion with a sublime uprightness, worthy of the Mother of God.

Her purity was likewise beyond comprehension. Like the crystal, which receives the rays of the sun in proportion to its purity and clearness, the Blessed Virgin’s Heart, exempt from the original stain and from every shadow of actual imperfection, acquired a purity adapted to the brightness of the lights it received. As an enclosed garden and a sealed fountain, it never afforded an entrance to the least worldly dust, to the least affection than might turn it away from the Supreme Good.

Even sleep could not interrupt its application to God or the transports of her devotion. In her Heart, as in a temple, the Lord was adored, loved, served and invoked more perfectly than in all the most august sanctuaries. And what a sanctuary, O God, was that in which the three divine Persons took delight! The eternal Father considered it as the master-piece of His power; the divine Word associated it with Himself in the difficult undertaking of our restoration; and the Holy Ghost enriched it with all the prerogatives and perfections suited to its sublime destiny.

Hence in this Heart there was no hindrance to grace. Grace abounded therein beyond all expression, never meeting any resistance. On the contrary, it was like a holy emulation between God and Mary, for the Lord was pleased to lavish His gifts on her, and she faithfully strove to derive profit therefrom. O fertile docility which, by making our Mother’s Heart the reservoir of the goods of the Redemption, rendered it pre-eminently the palace of the eternal King, a palace more splendid than heaven itself.

Had we, like Mary, constantly corresponded with the heavenly lights and the inspirations, should we not already be saints in the sight of God? But, alas! how different is the case! We are full of imperfections and lack solid virtue, because we prefer our views, our tastes, our will, our inclinations to the desires of Jesus, who unceasingly strives to sanctify us.

O my God, I am sincerely resolved to correspond more faithfully to Thy attractions, and especially to those that prompt me to make mental prayer, for, by its means, I can render my heart humble, so as to give Thee glory for every thing, and pure, so that it may have no earthly attachment, and devout, so that it may unreservedly consecrate itself to Thee, and faithful, so that it may refuse nothing to Thy grace, and be conformed to all Thy desires.

II. Charity Of Mary’s Heart

The Blessed Virgin’s love for God was figured, according to St. Germanus, by the altar of propitiation, on which the fire was never extinguished, but burned by day and by night (Levit. 6. 12). St. Jerome compares Mary to the bush Moses saw burning without being consumed (Exod. 3. 2). It was truly wonderful, says Bernardine de Bustis, how Mary loved her Creator uninterruptedly from her conception to her death by a continuous act. Her understanding, ever united to the uncreated Wisdom, constantly studied it and, in some manner, identified herself with it. Hence her unreserved submission, by which her will became one with that of God.

The Mother of God is also rightly represented as a woman clothed with the sun (Apoc. 12. 1), that is, wholly penetrated with divine charity; she has the moon under her feet, to signify her entire detachment from transitory goods. On her head there is a crown of twelve stars, the symbols of the sublime virtues produced in her by divine love.

To what fire, O our august Sovereign, can we compare the fire that consumed thee? Is it to the ardor of the seraphim? To the combined flames of the denizens of heaven? No; for thy love immensely surpasses that of all creatures put together. As much as Mary, by becoming the Mother of God, participated in her Son’s grandeurs, so great also was her participation in His boundless charity. Her Heart is as a vast furnace, the extent of which God alone can measure, and God alone can appreciate the intensity of the flames perpetually enkindled therein.

Let us ask of this Queen of charity a spark of the fire that burns within her and enables her to practice all virtues in an incomprehensible degree. Were our heart to have some love of God, would we be so languid in His service, so cold at mental prayer, Mass and holy Communion; so eager for distractions, rest, pleasures and sensual gratification, instead of seeking recollection, work and mortification?

O truly great and generous Heart of the purest of virgins! Heart all aglow with the most holy ardor! impart to me, first, the light which showed thee the lovely splendor of the divine perfections; and secondly, the sacred flames, which disengaged thee from the earth and from thyself, and raised thee to the most intimate union with God’s holy will. Enable me to watch constantly over my thoughts and affections, so that I may, after thy example, direct them solely to the supreme, immutable and eternal Good.