Today is the 10th anniversary of Blessed Teresa’s death. (August 26, 1910 -Sept 5, 1997) Here is a Vatican website link offering a short biography on her life.
Mother Teresa was known for her great love of the poor, including unwanted unborn and newborn babies. She spoke out often against abortion. See our previous post, Peace Begins in the Womb. The following is a quote from her about the Unborn Christ Child:
As John the Baptist recognized Jesus hidden in the womb of Mary, the first tabernacle of the Lord, so now we recognize Jesus hidden in the Blessed Sacrament, the mystery of our faith. Elizabeth was filled with the Holy Spirit and John leaped for joy in His Presence then, as we rejoice in His Presence now, for here Jesus pours out His Spirit upon us in this sacrament of infinite love.
From Rosary Meditations by Blessed Teresa of Calcutta
To be pregnant is not an easy thing. There is often much suffering for the mother in whom the new life is growing. But, there is also wondrous beauty attached to pregnancy and the pregnant mother becomes a reminder of the greatest good and the strongest hope known to humankind. She is a messenger in a sense. She is called expectant, a term which underscores the reward of patient endurance.
Well, Christians share in something like pregnancy in that they carry a Life within them other than their own – it is the Living God Who has humbled Himself to come into their hearts and dwell there. This Divine Life grows within them and they are called upon to share this Life, to manifest it, to express it, in a sense to give birth to it.
And as the pregnant mother feels the baby stirring within her body, so the Christian feels the Spirit of God stirring within. In a clever twist of imagery, St. Paul tells the Christians of Galatia “…I am again in travail until Christ be formed in you!” (Gal. 4.19)
It is simple to see why God has provided us with the pregnant Mother of the Lord as a model. Her nine months of pregnancy were not easy but they were tremendously beneficial. As the Child God formed and grew in her, she was formed by Him and grew closer to Him. We too must allow God to be formed in us and grow in us so that we, like Mary, can likewise be formed by Him and grow closer to Him.
Today, August 6, is the Feast of the Transfiguration of Our Lord. Through much of His life Jesus preferred to remain hidden. Even the three short years that He preached and performed miracles were done in a way that seemed in many ways ordinary. The Transfiguration stands alone as a moment when Jesus allowed the veil between heaven and earth to drop, letting us see a measure of His glory generally hidden during His life on earth.
Father Faber comments on the hiddeness and glory of Christ before birth:
“Yet how wonderful are those few samples of the occupations of the Nine Months which we have been allowed to see! If these are few, and superficial, and not in their true depth comprehended by us, what must have been the works of that active and contemplative life, so full of reality, energy, substance, and accomplishment, as we have already seen it to be! What must they have been in multitude, since these were momentary; what in grandeur, since these lie within our reach; what in unknown wonders, of whose existence we cannot dream, because they are so far down in God.
Almost always we may be sure that what we see of God is less grand than what we do not see. He shows us what we can bear, and strengthens us to see much which our weak nature could never bear; and yet after all it is little better than the surface of His brightness, the back of His glory, as Moses calls it, which we see. Even the grandeur, which we see, we do not see in its real greatness, its absolute and essential gloriousness.”
From Bethlehem by Father Faber
Recently two Potters have been in the spotlight. Harry Potter with a new book and movie and Beatrix Potter with the movie Miss Potter (which by the way, I thought was a really charming movie). But for us the Potter of distinction is Venerable Mary Potter who founded the Sisters of the Little Company of Mary on July 2, 1877. Here is quote which she directs to Mary:
“…Jesus, Body and Soul, rested in peaceful repose within your pure womb, and was wholly yours. Rapturous joy thrilled through your soul as your Immaculate Heart gave the Eternal Word His mortal life, His Precious Blood, and “the Word was made Flesh, and dwelt within you.” Great was your joy, O Mary, for you didst joy in the joy of your God, of your Son, and greater far than this joy was the joy of Jesus within you, as to your heart He spoke a voiceless word, and that word was Mother.”
from the book The Path of Mary
Today August 2, 2007 is the feast day of St. Peter Julian Eymard. In the following passage he reflects on the Gospel scene recorded in Luke 1:39-56.
“St. John’s first grace was one of adoration. The Word was in Mary’s womb. He inspired His mother to visit Elizabeth; Mary carried to John his Master and King. John could not come, for his mother was too old to undertake that journey; Jesus Christ went to him. He did the same for us; we could not go to God; God came to us.
When Mary “saluted” Elizabeth, she loosened the power of her divine Son….How good our Lord was to John! He wanted to bless him and make Himself known to him from his mother’s womb. How pleasing to Him the adoration of His precursor must have been! It was so spontaneous!
Jesus stayed with him three months. They were both hidden within the maternal tabernacle. John constantly adored his God; he felt His hidden presence. Join in St. John’s adoration, which was so real and heartfelt in spite of the veils and barriers that separated him from his Lord.”
Mother St. Paul wrote this of the unborn Christ Child who rested in His mother’s womb.
“Come, my little King, Who art nevertheless the Eternal Wisdom, come and teach me this heavenly prudence….”
“…and in my own life when things seem, as they sometimes do inexplicable and beyond human ken. Oh! come and teach me that the way of prudence is to lie still like a little child in its mother’s arms, not to try to fathom nor to understand, but to say: I am in the Arms of the Eternal Wisdom, Who can do all things, Who loves me with an infinite love and Who is disposing all things sweetly, gently, mercifully for my sake. This is the lesson the Child (Christ) yet unborn would teach.”
Mother St. Paul, Ortus Christi, 1921
“A cloistered life among men may cover the whole earth with its activity, if it is a life of worship, while the conqueror, the statesmen, or the man of letters have at most but a circle which they only influence partially, and in which their influence is but one of many influences. Worship alone is power, intellectual power and moral power, the power of worldwide change and all beneficent revolution.
We not only learn this lesson from the life of confinement, which the Incarnate Word led in Mary’s (Womb), but it is that life which gives our life power to become universal like itself.”
Father F.W. Faber, (1814-1863) Bethlehem
Filed under: Unborn Jesus
The Annunciation painted by Maurice Denis
The following quotes about the pregnancy of Mary are from Cardinal Pierre De Berulle, ( 1575 – 1629) who founded the French school of Spirituality. St. Vincent de Paul said of him: “He is one of the most saintly priests I have known”
“The period of this mystery invites us to reflect carefully on it often. For it is the period when he is and will be nine months in the Virgin…He is in her as in a temple where he praises and adores God; where he offers his respects to the eternal Father, not only for Himself but for every creature.”
“He wished to share the mystery of the Incarnation with her, by drawing forth from her this body with which he is clothed and by willing that, as his mother, she was involved through her cooperation in this work, which is incomparably greater than the creation of the world.”
This third quote from De Berulle was of interest to me because I had never thought about Mary being the first one to know about and experience the Incarnation. The Messiah, (her people had longed for his coming for centuries) had just come into the world – She realized that God Himself was the Messiah and she carried Him in her womb. De Berulle explains what she must have thought and how she must have felt:
“The Virgin is involved with Jesus and she is the only one in the whole world involved with Jesus. Thus she is the only one in the whole world adoring the mystery of the Incarnation, which was brought about on earth for the earth but unknown to the earth. She is the only one adoring Jesus. The more that she is the only one captivated by such a great subject, the greater is her involvement. She is devoted to it with all her faculties. All her senses are brought to bear on it, for it is a tangible mystery and tangible within her. All her senses should pay homage to her God made tangible for human nature. Her whole mind is concentrated on it. And the Spirit of Jesus, which enlivens this little divinized body, enlivens the spirit and body of the Virgin as well, through grace, love and a holy, gentle influence.”
Filed under: Unborn Jesus
Today June 11 is the feast day of St. Benedict. Benedict (born c. 480 -d. 547) was known as the patriarch of western monasticism. Here are some quotes from the Rule of St. Benedict (Chp. 6, Of Silence):
“Let us do what the Prophet saith: ” I said, I will take heed of my ways, that I sin not with my tongue: I have set a guard to my mouth, I was dumb, and was humbled, and kept silence even from good things” (Psalm 38(39): 2-3).”
“For it belongeth to the master to speak and to teach; it becometh the disciple to be silent and to listen.”
The reflection below is from Father Faber. Faber shows us how Christ taught us the power of silence and worship even from His mother’s womb:
“So that, in the first moment of the Incarnation, not only were the amazing decrees of everlasting wisdom fulfilled, and creation with incredible magnificence completed, but the creation thus completely turned round as it were to the Face of the Creator, and worshiped Him with a worship equal to Himself….”
“Such was the existence which began that night in Mary’s (womb). If we look at it in the general, so as to get a view of the characteristics, it seems to us, first of all, a life of oblation. Worship was the predominant idea. Adoration was the mold in which it was cast. It continually reflected God….”
“Worship alone is power, intellectual power and moral power, the power of world-wide change and of all beneficent revolution. We not only learn this lesson from the life of confinement, which the Incarnate Word led in Mary’s (womb), but it is that life which gives our life power to become universal like itself.”
“It was a life of silence also. The Great Teacher, the utterer of the marvelous parables, the preacher of the world stirring sermons, the oracle whose single words have become vocations, institutions and histories, finds silence no bar to the fertility of His action. Silence has ever been as it were the luxury of great holiness, which implies that is contains something divine within itself. So it is the first life which He, the eternally silent-spoken Word of the Father chooses for Himself.” Above quotes from Father F. W. Faber, Bethlehem.
Filed under: Unborn Jesus
Mother of the Incarnate Word
by Fr. William McNichols
O JESUS, living in Mary,
Come and live in Thy servants,
In the spirit of Thy sanctity,
In the fulness of Thy strength,
In the reality of Thy virtues,
In the perfection of Thy ways,
In the communion of Thy
mysteries.
Dominate over every opposing
power
In Thine own Spirit, to the
glory of the Father.
Amen.
Prayer of Venerable Father Olier
“He, in her, carried on the blessed converse with His Father; there was never any separation between Mary and the Blessed Fruit of her womb, Jesus. She would come back to Him with all the more joy, and tell Him what she had been doing and saying…When we think of Jesus praying for nine months to His Father, when we think of Mary’s nine months’ colloquy with Jesus, we begin to think that there is something wrong about our methods of prayer, that they need re modeling. Let us try to understand something of what His prayer was.“
Mother St. Paul, Ortus Christ
“I put myself on the side of childhood – on the side of the assassinated child, Abel as well as on the side of the victorious child David; of the child Joseph who reigned in Egypt and of the Hebrew children who sang their joy in a furnace and were subjected to lions and flames. I am above all on the side of the Infant God who promised happiness to the meek.” From The Son of Man by François Mauriac who won the Nobel Prize in Literature, 1952
“When He came into the world as a tiny unborn baby, Jesus placed Himself squarely “on the side of childhood”. He demonstrated His solidarity with all unborn children, and later with children at every stage of life. Would that all were pledged to be “on the side of childhood” ‑ with the Infant God ‑ throughout all of its many stages, from conception and early life in the mother’s womb to late adolescence when the child prepares to go out on his own. If the world were truly on the side of childhood, we would live in a much more innocent and receptive world.” From Unborn Jesus Our Hope
Filed under: Unborn Jesus
The Feast of the Immaculate Heart of Mary – June 16
The following excerpt from the book Unborn Jesus Our Hope discusses the relationship between Unborn Jesus and His mother.
Even the physical movements of her Son within her womb, which she could feel, and later even partly observe from without, were as signs of the more profound spiritual and intellectual movements of the soul of Jesus. For His part, Jesus too was experiencing the sense of touch as He would touch the inner wall of Mary’s uterus via the thin veil of the amniotic sac. This divine touch within from within – one can almost envision a Sistine Chapel-like ceiling painting of God, not the Father but the little unborn Son, straining forward and reaching out His tiny finger towards the inner heart of Mary His mother – can almost give shape to God’s way of touching each human heart from deep within. There was a continuous exchange between mother and Child, not only on the physical level but at every level…
In this particular mother Child exchange it was the Child Jesus who was the dominant participant, and His mother was the frequent recipient to the extent that Mary’s life was a reflection, a magnification of the hidden, unborn Divine Life within her.
Filed under: Unborn Jesus
Yesterday we talked about the Church’s longstanding devotion to the Christ Child. A natural extension of that devotion is devotion to the Unborn Christ Child.
We can demonstrate that Unborn Jesus, during His nine months in the womb, identified with unborn children in many ways. (See our post on the Visitation for part of this demonstration). Once we make this simple but profound connection between Unborn Jesus and all unborn children today –especially those at risk – the devotion takes shape quite logically.
It is, like most devotions, a devotion of discovery. That is, we discover Christ in a new and powerful way. And in discovering Unborn Jesus we re-discover the beauty and meaning of each unborn child. He is like a prism through which we see the human integrity and beauty of all unborn children, no matter their age, size, color, shape or other characteristics.
This discovery of the Unborn God leads our thoughts to a unifying principle of supernatural awareness, such that the Christian devotional heart harmonizes with the Christian social conscience! A powerful unity of purpose which brings together Christian spirituality on the one hand with this basic human rights issue – the right to life of unborn children – on the other hand. Both hands in prayer.
We are presented with an altogether unique devotional opportunity. The devotional heart and the social conscience each inform and heighten the awareness of the other. The right to life of unborn children is linked to the life of the Unborn Savior. Devotion leads to action. (And for a different side of the coin, see our post on The Sacred Heart.)
Filed under: Unborn Jesus
The life of Jesus Christ has enamored Christians from the earliest days. While we don’t know a lot about His hidden years growing up in Nazareth, and then working as a carpenter, yet every aspect of His life and all the events of His life fascinate us and draw us deeper into the mystery of His Person and mission.
No doubt it was such a loving fascination with Christ that caused
St Francis of Assisi (1182 -1226) one Christmas to construct a manger and re-enact the Christmas story. The focal point of his devotional creation was the little newborn baby Jesus – an act of tender devotion by a loving disciple.
A contemporary of Francis’ – and another Franciscan – St. Anthony of Padua (1195-1231), whose feast day is today, is almost always portrayed in paintings and sculptures holding the small Christ Child and looking intently at His face. This portrayal is based on an actual event that was witnessed by a friend of Anthony’s one evening.
What drew the mystic Francis (who had received the stigmata) and this Doctor of the Church, Anthony, to the baby Jesus?
The great St. Teresa of Avila (another reformer of the Church, like Francis) had a devotion to the Christ Child also and in each of the many convents which she founded she placed a statue of the Christ Child. What drew this sixteenth century saint to this young Child?
Do we not find Christ in His utter simplicity and lowliness when we see Him as a Child? But also, He is God approachable – as in the crib – who can fear God as newborn baby? Who would not be able to draw near to God in His “helplessness”, His weakness, His poverty, His innocent childlike revelation of Himself?
Jesus as a baby and infant calls the world to Himself – we can whisper something to Him and even be playful with Him. Certainly, this is part of the message of St. Therese of Lisieux (1873-1897) also known as Theresa of the Child Jesus. From her own childhood she was attracted to the Child Jesus. She wrote to Him, drew pictures for Him and learned spiritual lessons from Him. Even in her early adult years (she died at the age of 24) she often thought of Christ (and her own life) in the simplest childlike terms. She called her path to God and Heaven “her little way”. And in the last century the Church weighed in on this “little way” – naming her Doctor of the Church (like her namesake Teresa of Avila).
As you can see the Church has had a rich tradition through the centuries of devotion to the Christ Child. Devotion to the Unborn Christ Child is simply an extension of devotion to the (born) Christ Child. Given the reality of abortion-on-demand, we think it is important for the Church to discover the solidarity established between Unborn Jesus and every unborn child, especially those unborn infants at risk.
Filed under: Unborn Jesus
The Gospel reading at Mass today recounts the scene when Jesus sat down across from the Temple Treasury and watched the people putting money into it. He spied a poor widow who “put in two small coins worth a few cents” – the famous “widow’s mite”. Jesus explained that she “put in more than all the other contributors”. This wonderful hopeful story touches on a theme that recurs in various ways in the New Testament. Remember when Jesus spoke about having faith “the size of a mustard seed”?
Here are some other examples:
“God chose what is weak in the world to shame the strong” I Cor 1:27
“…for when I am weak, then I am strong.” II Cor 12:10
St. Paul says that God spoke these words to him:
“My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” II Cor 12:9
Christ too came in “weakness”, first as a tiny unborn baby, then an infant, toddler and so on. He took on our weaknesses as part of His Incarnation. He even singled out the “least” to identify with them in a most special manner: “Truly, I say to you, as you did it to one of the least of these my brethren, you did it to me.” (Mt 25:40) And we know that the unborn are among the “least of the least”. Where Christ is, there is hope…
Now this relates to the world’s current struggle between the Culture of Life and the Culture of Death. And it is again the amazing St. Paul who reveals this mystery of Providence to us: “…where sin increased, grace abounded all the more…” (Rom 5:20) St. Paul is pointing not to a half empty glass of sin but to a glass already half full of Grace and rising, continuing to fill even more. We live in a culture that is rampant with sins, and among these abortion is near the top of the list – quite possibly at the top – yet God is pouring out His Grace on our world to bring about a pro – life surge of awareness and awakening! Rejoice!
Filed under: Unborn Jesus
STRUEB, Hans and/or Jakob
The Visitation
c. 1505
The Visitation
by
Joyce Kilmer
(For Louise Imogen Guiney)
There is a wall of flesh before the eyes
Of John, who yet perceives and hails his King.
It is Our Lady’s painful bliss to bring
Before mankind the Glory of the skies.
Her cousin feels her womb’s sweet burden rise
And leap with joy, and she comes forth to sing,
With trembling mouth, her words of welcoming.
She knows her hidden God, and prophesies.
Saint John, pray for us, weary souls that tarry
Where life is withered by sin’s deadly breath.
Pray for us, whom the dogs of Satan harry,
Saint John, Saint Anne, and Saint Elizabeth.
And, Mother Mary, give us Christ to carry
Within our hearts, that we may conquer death.
Filed under: Unborn Jesus
When we speak of the Visitation we usually refer to Mary’s journey to the hill country to visit her cousin Elizabeth. In fact, that is how Luke’s Gospel recounts the event (Lk 1:39). But we can also view it as God journeying to the hill country to visit His people, or more specifically, to visit an unborn baby. St. Peter Julian Eymard sums up the visit this way:
“The Word was in Mary’s womb. He inspired His mother to visit Elizabeth; Mary carried to John his Master and King. John could not come, for his mother was too old to undertake that journey; Jesus Christ went to him. He did the same for us: we could not go to God; God came to us.”
The Catechism of the Catholic Church carefully explains what happens next:
“John was ‘filled with the Holy Spirit even from his mother’s womb’ by Christ Himself, whom the Virgin Mary had just conceived by the Holy Spirit. Mary’s visitation to Elizabeth thus became a visit from God to his people.” (717)
Maybe many of us have had a tendency to picture this whole scene in a different way, thinking of this just-conceived Christ as passively hidden within the womb of Mary while the dynamic Holy Spirit descends upon John and Elizabeth both, causing the unborn John to leap and the pregnant Elizabeth to exclaim in wonder. But the just-conceived Christ is not passive! First He inspires Mary to journey to Elizabeth (and unborn John). Then, as the Catechism says, He causes the Holy Spirit to fill John.
Just think, the Annunciation/Incarnation occurs, Jesus Christ is now officially an unborn baby, and He travels “with haste” (Lk 1:39) – where?, to whom? – to another unborn baby! Then, as if to leave no doubt as to His Holy intentions, He dramatically pours forth His Spirit upon the unsuspecting unborn baby John. Suddenly, definitively, Grace rushes upon one chosen person – John the Baptist. We see the redemption of humanity and the New Creation in Christ prefigured here, encapsulated as it were, in the womb of Elizabeth. Here is a concrete living example of the words from the Prologue of John’s Gospel: “And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, full of grace and truth…And from his fullness have we all received, grace upon grace “(Jn 1:14,16).
This is a marvelous prophetic event for the Church and for the world. When Blessed Teresa of Calcutta gave her Nobel Peace Prize Lecture in December 1979, she reminded the world of this Gospel event, focusing on these two unborn babies. And John Paul II refers to this same event several times in his prophetic encyclical letter The Gospel of Life (issued in 1995).
UNBORN WORD of the day 
