Mary, Vessel of Devotion, Mary: Day 155

Mary, Vessel of Devotion

Blessed John Henry Newman illustrates the meaning of devotion, and shows how Our Lady overflowed with devotion to her son.

To be devout is to be devoted. We know what is meant by a devoted wife or daughter. It is one whose thoughts center in the person so deeply loved, so tenderly cherished. She follows him about with her eyes; she is ever seeking some means of serving him; and if her services are very small in their character, that only shows how intimate they are, and how unceasing. And especially if the object of her love be weak, or in pain, or near to die, still more intensely does she live in his life, and know nothing but him.

This intense devotion towards our Lord, forgetting self in love for him, is displayed in St. Paul, who says: “I know nothing but Jesus Christ and him cruci- fied” (see 1 Cor 2:2). And again, “I live, [yet] now not I, but Christ liveth in me; and [the life] that I now live in the flesh, I live in the faith of the Son of God, who loved me, and delivered himself for me” (see Gal 2:20).

But great as was St. Paul’s devotion to our Lord, much greater was that of the Blessed Virgin: because she was his mother, and because she had him and all his sufferings actually before her eyes, and because she had the long intimacy of thirty years with him, and because she was from her special sanctity so unspeak- ably near to him in spirit. When, then, he was mocked, bruised, scourged, and nailed to the Cross, she felt as keenly as if every indignity and torture inflicted on him was struck at herself. She could have cried out in agony at every pang of his. This is called her compassion, or her suffering with her Son, and it arose from this that she was the “Vessel of Devotion” unlike any other.
—Blessed John Henry Newman, Meditations and Devotions

IN GOD’S PRESENCE, CONSIDER . . .
Am I devoted to Jesus and his mother in the sense described here? In what practical ways do I show my devotion?

CLOSING PRAYER
From a prayer of St. Bridget: O Lady, by the love that you bear for Jesus, help me to love him.

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