Meditation 70
MATER DOLOROSA
1. Queen of Martyrs.
Suffering is a general law that applies to all men without exception. The child needs no one to teach him how to cry and weep. His subsequent life will also be spent between mourning and weeping. We cannot escape suffering. It awaits us where we least expect it. Perhaps when we are surrounded by the greatest joys of life. Indeed, these are often just a prelude to tears. When you receive some very great joy, think that soon, perhaps, some severe shock, either physical or moral, of the body or of the soul, from within or from without, will eventually strike you. It is sheer madness to want to enjoy life by merely escaping suffering. The thorns are least painful when we meet them generously. Welcome them and, above all, sanctify them and raise every sorrow or suffering to the supernatural order.
Jesus wanted to be called the Man of Sorrows and His Mother the Queen of Martyrs. These are your models. They are the only ones who through their example can comfort you and teach you how to sanctify them. "Blessed be suffering," Christ has said. Blessed are those who weep, those who mourn, those who suffer. We should feel pity on the one who does not know how to suffer, not on the one who suffers much. Our Lord made His Mother sharer of His glory, and on that account He made Her also the companion of all His sufferings. The more God loves a soul, the more sufferings He sends it in order to raise it to greater glory just as He did with His own Mother. How much did Our Lady suffer at the foot of the cross! But how great is Mary at the foot of the Cross! What a pearl would be missing from Her crown if She did not possess the pearl of suffering! It was necessary, since She was a Queen, that She should als o be Queen of Suffering and of Martyrdom. And if She is the Queen of Sorrows, She must have suffered more than anyone else a martyrdom that lasted a life time.
To us God sends sufferings one by one. And He keeps our future sufferings from our knowledge. We only suffer the present. But to Mary from the beginning He revealed all that She had to suffer in order not to spare Her sorrow but that the sword of suffering should remain in Her heart Her whole life through. Think of Her sufferings. How deeply was She wounded by the ingratitude, by the betrayal, by the abandonment, by the indifference of which Her Son was made a target. Bethlehem, Egypt, Nazareth, Jerusalem, the Crib and Calvary, the Temple, the palaces of Herod and Pilate. In all those places Her heart was horribly lacerated. She even went through the loss of Jesus in order to teach us how to suffer and how to seek Him whenever we lose Him by sin. Stop and ponder over the sufferings of your Mother.
[Excerpted from 'MARIAN MEDITATIONS' Book by Rev. Dr. Ildefonso R. Villar, Salesian Philippine Province, Nihil Obstat; Imprimatur]
MATER DOLOROSA
1. Queen of Martyrs.
Suffering is a general law that applies to all men without exception. The child needs no one to teach him how to cry and weep. His subsequent life will also be spent between mourning and weeping. We cannot escape suffering. It awaits us where we least expect it. Perhaps when we are surrounded by the greatest joys of life. Indeed, these are often just a prelude to tears. When you receive some very great joy, think that soon, perhaps, some severe shock, either physical or moral, of the body or of the soul, from within or from without, will eventually strike you. It is sheer madness to want to enjoy life by merely escaping suffering. The thorns are least painful when we meet them generously. Welcome them and, above all, sanctify them and raise every sorrow or suffering to the supernatural order.
Jesus wanted to be called the Man of Sorrows and His Mother the Queen of Martyrs. These are your models. They are the only ones who through their example can comfort you and teach you how to sanctify them. "Blessed be suffering," Christ has said. Blessed are those who weep, those who mourn, those who suffer. We should feel pity on the one who does not know how to suffer, not on the one who suffers much. Our Lord made His Mother sharer of His glory, and on that account He made Her also the companion of all His sufferings. The more God loves a soul, the more sufferings He sends it in order to raise it to greater glory just as He did with His own Mother. How much did Our Lady suffer at the foot of the cross! But how great is Mary at the foot of the Cross! What a pearl would be missing from Her crown if She did not possess the pearl of suffering! It was necessary, since She was a Queen, that She should als o be Queen of Suffering and of Martyrdom. And if She is the Queen of Sorrows, She must have suffered more than anyone else a martyrdom that lasted a life time.
To us God sends sufferings one by one. And He keeps our future sufferings from our knowledge. We only suffer the present. But to Mary from the beginning He revealed all that She had to suffer in order not to spare Her sorrow but that the sword of suffering should remain in Her heart Her whole life through. Think of Her sufferings. How deeply was She wounded by the ingratitude, by the betrayal, by the abandonment, by the indifference of which Her Son was made a target. Bethlehem, Egypt, Nazareth, Jerusalem, the Crib and Calvary, the Temple, the palaces of Herod and Pilate. In all those places Her heart was horribly lacerated. She even went through the loss of Jesus in order to teach us how to suffer and how to seek Him whenever we lose Him by sin. Stop and ponder over the sufferings of your Mother.
[Excerpted from 'MARIAN MEDITATIONS' Book by Rev. Dr. Ildefonso R. Villar, Salesian Philippine Province, Nihil Obstat; Imprimatur]
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