The Catholic Book Blogger
True devotion to Mary is interior, tender, and holy
St. Louis de Montfort identifies the first three of five characteristics of a genuine devotion to Mary.
True devotion to Our Lady is interior. That is to say, it comes from the spirit and the heart. It flows from the esteem we have of her, the high idea we have formed of her greatness, and the love which we have for her.
True devotion is tender; that is to say, full of confidence in her, like a child’s confidence in his loving mother. This confidence makes the soul turn to her in all its bodily or mental necessities, with much simplicity, trust, and tenderness.
It implores the aid of its good mother, at all times, in all places, and about all things: in its doubts, that it may be enlightened; in its wanderings, that it may be brought into the right path; in its temptations, that it may be supported; in its weaknesses, that it may be strengthened; in its falls, that it may be lifted up; in its discouragements, that it may be cheered; in its scruples, that they may be taken away; in its crosses, toils, and disappointments of life, that it may be consoled under them. In a word, in all its evils of body and mind, the soul’s ordinary refuge is in Mary, without fearing to be troublesomely persistent with her or to displease Jesus Christ.
True devotion to Our Lady is holy; that is to say, it leads the soul to avoid sin, and to imitate in the Blessed Virgin particularly her profound humility, her lively faith, her continual prayer, her universal mortification, her divine purity, her ardent charity, her heroic patience, her angelical sweetness, and her divine wisdom. These are the ten principal virtues of the most holy Virgin. —St. Louis de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary
IN GOD’S PRESENCE, CONSIDER . . .
When I pray the Rosary or take part in other Marian devotions, can I honestly say that I meet these first three criteria that St. Louis provides here? If not, which aspects of my devotion do I need to correct or strengthen?
CLOSING PRAYER
Blessed Lady, show me how to cultivate an authentic devotion to you that will lead me most readily to your son Jesus. Hail Mary…
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