Our Lady Completely United Victim with Him-Our Lady of Compassion(31st March 2023)

My dear brethren,

I am very happy to be again with you for this Holy Week, by the grace of God and the permission given by my District Superior, Fr Brucciani. Please, pray for him.

The feast of our Lady of Compassion is normally a commemoration today. However, Archbishop Lefebvre chose our Lady of Compassion to be the patroness of the Sisters of the Society of Saint Pius X. One of them, Sister Mary Joseph, is from Seoul. Now, last year, our Superior General, Father Pagliarani, decided in his counsel to share the holy patrons. Principal patrons are of first class. Therefore, now the patron of the priests (St Pius X), the patroness of the Sisters (our Lady of Compassion) and the patroness of our Oblates (again, our Lady under the title of her Seven Sorrows on 15th September) are feasts of first class for all the religious members of the Society of Saint Pius X.

  

This is very good for all of us. Archbishop Lefebvre had a great love for our Lady at the foot of the Cross. The offering of the Redeeming Sacrifice was the very purpose of the Incarnation, of the whole life of our Lord; indeed, He said about the hour of His Passion: “Now is my soul troubled. And what shall I say? Father, save me from this hour? But for this cause, I came unto this hour” (Jn. 12:27). He is the Saviour, He came to save us, to save us from sin by His Sacrifice: it is His supreme lesson, the supreme example He gave us of all virtues, the very moment in which He redeemed the world, the fulfilment of His Mission.

Our Lady is all for our Lord; she is the perfect Handmaid of the Lord. So, if His life was entirely directed towards His Sacrifice, so was her life all directed towards the Cross. The supreme hour of her mission was to stand there with our Lord and be completely united with His Offering in one perfect Sacrifice. She was fully one victim with Him.

There is one aspect of that great mystery which I would like to develop.

Our Lady is Virgin and Mother.

She is perfect virgin, in all aspect, being absolutely pure, not only physically but above all spiritually, pure from any sin, even any venial sin. She is Immaculate. She is immaculate even in her conception, being preserved from original sin by a unique privilege. “Thou art all fair, O my love, and there is not a stain in thee” (Cant. 4:7). She is so pure first of all in order to be a worthy receptacle of the Incarnate Word of God at the Incarnation, which we celebrated last Saturday, 25th of March (the Incarnation happened on the day of the Annunciation). But, in the Scriptures, to be immaculate is first of all a requirement of the victim of the Sacrifice. St Peter says: “you were not redeemed with corruptible things as gold or silver, from your vain conversation of the tradition of your fathers: But with the precious blood of Christ, as of a lamb immaculate and undefiled,” (1 Pet. 1:18-19). And St Paul says: “the blood of Christ, who by the Holy Ghost offered himself immaculate unto God, shall cleanse our conscience from dead works, to serve the living God” (Heb. 9:14). Similarly for our Lady, she is immaculate in order to be at the foot of the Cross, fittingly one with Christ the Immaculate Lamb.

 

She is also Mother. This is the very core of her mission, in Greek: Theotokos (Θεοτόκος), the one who gave birth to God. Christ is one Person, both true God, Son of the Father, and true man son of the Blessed Virgin Mary. One Person with two natures. She gave birth to a Son who is true God; because He is her son, He is true man; because He is the Son of the Father, He is true God. Yet He is the one Jesus, One Person. I have often preached about the divinity of Christ, and indeed it is absolutely essential to our Faith to acknowledge Jesus as true God. He does not cease to be true God even in the depth of His suffering and Passion. But today, I would like to consider with you that He is also true man, the New Adam, perfect man who restores what the first messed up.

Our Lord is indeed true man, He humbled himself, “emptied himself, taking the form of a servant, being made in the likeness of men, and in habit found as a man.” He got up early morning as we do, He prayed as a man, He walked with His apostles, He was even tired and rested on the edge of the well at Samaria, He hid from the Pharisees as a man, He was eating and drinking (moderately) as a man. St Augustine said: “The strength of Christ made thee; the weakness of Christ redeemed thee. The power of Christ  made all things out of nothing; the weakness of Christ so wrought that what was made would not perish. His strength hath made us, and His weakness saved us.”

Above all, He suffered as a man; St Paul said: “ He humbled himself, becoming obedient unto death, even to the death of the cross” (Phil. 2:7-8). It is good for us to consider His human nature, and especially how much He suffered for us: if a nail would be put through our hands and feet, how much would we hurt! His sensibility was perfect, and so He felt even more. If we are unjustly condemned, we feel that unjustly deeply; how much more He felt the injustice of His condemnation, who is Innocence itself and Who had done so much good to His people! He has a human heart, and loved His Apostles: how much then did He feel the betrayal of Judas, the denial of Peter, the abandonment by all the others (except John)!

 

Normally His human soul was filled with the beatific joy flowing from above, from His Divinity. But in His Passion, this overflowing of joy was somehow halted, and He felt somehow abandoned by His Father (though in the top of His soul there remained that Hypostatic Union), and He said: “My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?” (Mt. 27:46).

No one knew better the human nature of Jesus than His Mother. God so designed our nature that a baby remains for nine months in the womb of his mother, so as to develop a wonderful bond between her and her child, which is at the natural level the greatest human love possible. If that is already true for normal mothers, how much more, how deeper was it true for our Lady, whose Child was given her by the Holy Ghost, the Spirit of Charity, of supreme Love! What bond with Jesus, what depth of love for Him grew in her immaculate Heart during these nine months, and only grew further after His birth at Christmas! She took great care for Him, nursing Him with her own milk, caring for all His human needs as the best of all mothers. And He loved her in return as the best of all children.

When everyone abandoned Him and turned against Him, when the crowd shouted “Crucify him, crucify him” (Lk. 23:21), she did not abandon Him, but for sure those words pierced her heart. She accompanied Him on the way of the Cross, she stood there at the foot of the Cross, feeling in her heart everything that He felt in His flesh.

In this Passion time, the Church sings at Lauds: “Willingly, freely, the Redeemer, dedicated to His Passion, is lifted up as a lamb to be immolated on the gibbet of the Cross.” He, as a man, is the Lamb of God, the Immaculate Victim. Our lady at His side, as His Mother, is fully one with Him as Victim; she is also an immaculate victim, one with the Immaculate Lamb. No human has ever suffered as much as Jesus and Mary. Because no one has loved God and men as much as they did, willing to offer themselves to restore the honour of God and for the salvation of men.

 It is good for us to meditate on all this, and today’s liturgy is very apt for this, with the wonderful “sequence” called “stabat mater”:

At the Cross her station keeping,Stood the mournful Mother weeping,Close to Jesus to the last.

Through her heart, His sorrow sharing,All His bitter anguish bearingNow at length the sword had passed.

Oh, how sad and sore distressedWas that Mother highly blessedOf the sole begotten One!

Christ above in torment hangs,She beneath beholds the pangsOf her dying, glorious Son.

Is there one who would not weep‘Whelmed in miseries so deepChrist’s dear Mother’s pain untold.

Can the human heart refrainFrom partaking in her pain,In that Mother’s pain untold?

Bruised, derided, cursed, defiled,She beheld her tender Child,All with bloody scourges rent.

For the sins of His own nationSaw Him hang in desolationTill His spirit forth He sent.

O sweet Mother! fount of love,Touch my spirit from above,Make my heart with yours accord.

Make me feel as you have felt;Make my soul to glow and meltWith the love of Christ, my Lord.

Holy Mother, pierce me through,In my heart each wound renewOf my Saviour crucified.

Let me share with you His pain,Who for all our sins was slain,Who for me in torments died.

Mix’d with yours let my tears be,Mourning Him Who mourned for me,All the days that I may live.

By the Cross with you to stay,There with you to weep and pray,Is all I ask of you to give.

Virgin of all virgins blest!Listen to my fond request:Let me share that grief of yours.

Let me, to my latest breath,In my body bear the deathOf that dying Son of yours.

Wounded with His every wound,Steep my soul till it has swoonedIn His very Blood away.

Christ, when You shall call me hence,Be Your Mother my defense,Be Your Cross my victory.

May our Lady of Compassion make us one with Jesus Crucified, so as to be one with Jesus glorified for ever in Heaven! Amen.

Fr. Laisney