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Lenten Journey Through the Sorrows of Mary: Let me stand and mourn with you

Posted on March 23, 2021 by Women of Grace Staff

March 23

At the cross, your sorrow sharing,

All your grief and torment bearing,

Let me stand and mourn with you.

For Reflection:

This stanza from Stabat Mater draws our attention to the fact that Mary stood under the Cross. What does it mean to stand? Reverend Weaver offers one characteristic of Mary’s stance: bravery. He says, “United with her heroic Son, Mary gives a shining example of the fortitude which must be practiced in the battle of life.” And of what is this fortitude the fruit? Prayer, says Father Weaver: “…prayer which comes from a heart that is in harmony with the Heart of God has tremendous power.” To what extent is your prayer life yielding the fortitude you need to stand with Mary? In what one way can you improve it today?

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Lenten Journey Through the Sorrows of Mary: Depths of my soul

Posted on March 22, 2021 by Women of Grace Staff

March 22

Mother, may this prayer be granted:

That Christ’s love may be implanted

In the depths of my poor soul.

For Reflection:

To love as Jesus loves. Mary lived this level of spiritual perfection. Dare we hope for it? Dare we wait for it? Henri Nouwen says that waiting is hope and tells us that “Hope is trusting that something will be fulfilled, but fulfilled according to the promises and not just according to our wishes.”

In the Novena to Our Lady of Hope, we read these verses from Sirach. Church fathers tell us they refer to Mary: I am the mother of fair love, and of fear, and of knowledge, and of holy hope. In me is all grace of the way and of the truth; in me is all hope of life and of virtue. Come to me all that desire me and be filled with my fruits (Sirach 24:24-26).

Mary makes us a promise. Come to her and she will fill us with her own beatitude. “O Blessed Virgin Mary, Mother of Grace, Hope of the world. Hear us, your children, who cry to you.”

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Lenten Journey Through the Sorrows of Mary: Fire me with your love

Posted on March 21, 2021 by Women of Grace Staff

March 21

Virgin, ever interceding,

Hear me in my fervent pleading:

Fire me with your love of Christ.

For Reflection:

Perhaps that which hinders us most from attaining “open-ended waiting” is our limited capacity to love. Today’s GraceLine contains the solution to this – we need Mary’s love of Christ since our own love is so weakened by concupiscence and sinfulness. St. Louis de Montfort tells us that if we consecrate ourselves to Jesus through Mary, our Mother gives us the operations of her soul. That means, we can receive her own love of Christ as our own. Is God asking you to make this consecration? Renew it? Live it more fully? How can you begin to do so today?

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Lenten Journey Through the Sorrows of Mary: All the sorrow

Posted on March 20, 2021 by Women of Grace Staff

March 20

Mary, fount of love’s devotion,

Let me share with true emotion

All the sorrow you endured.

For Reflection:

Rev. Bertrand Weaver, C.P. writes in his book, His Cross in Your Life, that God willed to have Mary at Calvary as an “associate teacher of wisdom.” He says that, “By accepting grief ‘great as the sea,’ she united with her Divine Son in giving mankind an example of bowing before the Will of God when it could not have been more difficult.” Nouwen may have put it this way: Mary’s life was a study of open-ended waiting, a characteristic of which is “giving up control over our future and letting God define our life.”

If you truly pray the above stanza of Stabat Mater you are asking for the same grace. You are asking to live open-ended waiting. To what extent are you really willing to pray for this? What would encourage you? What would hinder you? Give all to Mary, Fount of Love’s Devotion.

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Lenten Journey Through the Sorrows of Mary: Breathe his very last

Posted on March 19, 2021 by Women of Grace Staff

March 19

Solemnity of Saint Joseph, husband of the Blessed Virgin Mary

Christ she saw with life-blood failing,

All her anguish unavailing,

Saw him breathe his very last.

For Reflection:

With Jesus, Mary had sojourned the agonizing road to Calvary. She had watched Him be beaten and tormented, ridiculed and spat upon. She had watched Him fall. And get up. Fall. And get up. Fall. And get up. She had watched nine inch nails pierce His hands and feet. She had seen Him hoisted into the air on a cross. And now she watches Him take His last breath as His life’s blood runs out. The soldier’s lance pierces them both. In light of this verse and meditation, read John 3:16. Substitute your name for “the world.” Sit with this truth and let it take hold of you. Journal your insights and reflections.

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Lenten Journey Through the Sorrows of Mary: Bruised and beaten by the rod

Posted on March 18, 2021 by Women of Grace Staff

March 18

Christ she saw, for our salvation,

Scourged with cruel acclamation,

Bruised and beaten by the rod.

For Reflection:

Henri Nouwen also tells us that waiting is active, not passive. It requires the gift of receptivity, an openess to that which God is doing in the midst of the waiting.

Meditate on the words “Christ she saw…” As this verse says, Mary’s eyes surely saw her Son’s physical condition while she gazed upon Him. But what else might Mary have been seeing as she held vigil at the foot of the Cross? What might she have seen God doing in the midst of this holocaust? What might He be doing as you “hold vigil” in your current waiting period?

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Lenten Journey Through the Sorrows of Mary: The Virgin’s grief

Posted on March 17, 2021 by Women of Grace Staff

March 17

Who, that sorrow contemplating,

On that passion meditating,

Would not share the Virgin’s grief?

For Reflection:

Henri Nouwen says that waiting is patient. He tells us that “The word ‘patience’ means the willingness to stay where we are and live the situation out to the full in the belief that something hidden there will manifest itself to us…Patient living means to live actively in the present and wait there.”

With comprehension and concentration, slowly read today’s GraceLine a second time. It is an invitation into Mary’s suffering – to share the Virgin’s grief. Ask Our Lady to take you into her Immaculate Heart and wait there with her. Wait with patience until what is hidden there manifests itself to you. Then journal about your insights.

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O Saint Joseph!

Posted on March 16, 2021 by Isabelle Liberatore

Happy Feast Day of St. Patrick tomorrow! And happy early Solemnity of St. Joseph, which we will celebrate this Friday, March 19th!!!

Wouldn’t it be wonderful if the world gave as much acclaim to St. Joseph as they did to St. Patrick? Though we love St. Patrick and all of the wonderful festivities that surround his special day, this year, not only do we celebrate the Feast of St. Joseph, but we do it during the Year of St. Joseph, as proclaimed by our Holy Father, Pope Francis. Shouldn’t we mark this occasion in a remarkable way?

One wonderful Catholic tradition is the St. Joseph altar! New Orleans is particularly known for embracing this tradition. Many families and parishes go so far as to compete with each other, with one altar more beautiful than the next. Each is covered in festive decorations and delicious-looking breads, designed to highlight St. Joseph’s special role in salvation history and family life. Here are just a few pictures that can be found across the internet.

St. Joseph Altars in New Orleans

It is fitting that we honor St. Joseph. After all, not only was he the earthly father of Jesus and the spouse of Our Lady, he is the patron of the Universal Church, as proclaimed by Pope John XXIII on March 19, 1961. On the occasion of his proclamation, he prayed:

“O St. Joseph!

Here, here is where you belong as Protector Universalis Ecclesiae! … Always be our protector. May thy inner spirit of peace, of silence, of good work, and of prayer for the cause of Holy Church always be an inspiration to us and bring us joy in union with thy blessed spouse, our most sweet and gentle and Immaculate Mother, and in the strong yet tender love of Jesus, the glorious and immortal King of all ages and peoples. Amen.” – Pope John XXIII

This week as we pray our Rosary Crusade together, let us ask St. Patrick, and especially St. Joseph to intercede for us, as we embrace each other and our intentions in prayer.

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Lenten Journey Through the Sorrows of Mary: Ever-patient in her yearning

Posted on March 16, 2021 by Women of Grace Staff

March 16

Ever-patient in her yearning

Though her tear-filled eyes were burning,

Mary gazed upon her Son.

For Reflection:

In his writing, The Spirituality of Waiting, Henri Nouwen gives five characteristics of waiting. He tells us waiting is a movement. “People who wait have received a promise that allows them to wait. … They have received something that is a work in them, like a seed that has started to grow… So waiting is never a movement from nothing to something. It is always a movement from something to something more.”

How is this truth depicted in the stanza above? Consider Mary’s gaze. What might have been transpiring in her heart as Mary looked upon her Son and as He gazed upon her? What promise(s) had she received and what might be the “something more” still yet to come?

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Lenten Journey Through the Sorrows of Mary: Mary watched her dying Son

Posted on March 15, 2021 by Women of Grace Staff

March 15

With what pain and desolation,

With what noble resignation,

Mary watched her dying Son.

For Reflection:

Many spiritual writers have discussed the “spirituality of waiting” and the

virtues it requires. Some of these are patience, long-suffering, trust,

surrender, humility, gratitude, receptivity, hope. In what ways do you think Mary embodied all of these as she watched her Son die? Which of these

do you most need to acquire?

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