Part eight (*), Chapter 11: Heart of Mary, Ocean of Grace

Heart of Mary, Ocean of Grace

IT is in the heart, that is, in the very depth and substance of the Christian soul, that sanctifying grace resides and exercises its powerful influence. There grace establishes the throne of its power, extending to the memory, the intellect and the will, affecting all the higher and lower faculties, and all the internal and external senses.

Granting this, I say that the admirable Heart of Mary is an ocean of grace. Yet it is not I who make this statement, it is the Archangel Gabriel, sent by God from Heaven to announce to the Queen of Angels that the divine Majesty had chosen her to be the Mother of His Divine Son. The Archangel greets Mary by telling her first of all that she is "full of grace." (1) Notice that he does not my she will be, but that she is full of grace.

Would you know how it is that Mary was full of grace even before the Son of God became Incarnate in her womb? You must consider two truths taught by several distinguished theologians.

The first is that Mary was filled with such eminent grace at the moment. of her Immaculate Conception that, according to many learned divines, she already surpassed the chief of Seraphim and the greatest of Saints. From the beginning of her existence she possessed more grace than they enjoyed at the time of their greatest perfection.

The second truth is that the heavenly Virgin was never idle, but remained constantly turned towards God, ever exercising her love for His divine Majesty. She loved Him with her whole Heart, her whole soul and all her strength, according to the full extent of the grace that was in her, so that grace was doubled in her soul, if not from moment to moment, at least from hour to hour, and perhaps more often. She had therefore attained to an inconceivable and unutterable degree of grace when the Archangel Gabriel saluted her as being full of grace.

Now if this most Blessed Virgin was so full of grace before conceiving (1). Luke 1, 28.

the Son of God, what must have been the abundance and plenitude of grace poured by the Holy S pirit into her Heart and her virginal bosom, to make her worthy to give birth to the Son whom the Eternal Father begets from all eternity in His own adorable bosom, to make her worthy to be the true Mother of His Son? Surely, the dignity of Mother of God being infinite, the grace bestowed on the Blessed Virgin to prepare her to give being and life to God Himself must also in a way be infinite, for St. Thomas assures us it was proportioned to her sublime dignity.

If it is a great privilege to be Mother of God, and if no grander destiny can be conceived, then for a mere creature to form the Son of God of her own substance, what shall we my of the glory of having Him in her womb and making Him live by her virginal blood for a space of nine months! What abundance of grace did the Holy Ghost pour into her Heart to make her worthy thus to continue her office of Motherhood towards such a Son! Who could fathom what the adorable Infant, infinitely rich , generous and grateful, gave in return to the Mother from whom He constantly received during those nine months a new being and a new life, a fife incomparably more precious than all the lives of angels and of men? To this we must add all the love and praises Mary incessantly tendered Him then. If Jesus bestows an eternal kingdom upon those who give a glass of water to the poor for love of Him, what gifts, what treasures, what graces did He constantly pour into Mary's pure Heart, in which He did not encounter the least obstacle to the inexhaustible blessings which He ardently wished to communicate to her.

Mary performed the duties of a Mother towards her Son Jesus not only when she conceived and gave birth to Him in Bethlehem; but also when she nourished Him, carried Him in her arms and on her bosom, clothed Him, delivered Him from the fury of Herod, brought Him to the Temple of Jerusalem, led Him back to Nazareth and cared for Him as every good mother cares for her child.

If, according to St. Bernardine,(2) Mary merited by her consent to the Incarnation of the Son of God more grace than all the angels and saints together by all their acts of virtue, what graces and merits must our Saviour's most worthy Mother have acquired when she so often carried Him on her virginal bosom. What blessings she received during her familiar conversations with her Son, when she possessed Him on earth and listened to His divine discourses; but above all when, in the Temple on the day of His presentation, as well as on Calvary at the time of His (2). Plus meruit gloriosa Virgo in suo consensu, scilicer conceptionis FiIii Dei, quam omnes creaturae, sive Angels, sive homines, in cunctis suis actibus, motibus et cogitationibus. Serm. 5 pro Festivitat B.M.V.

death, she offered Him to the Eternal Father as a sacrifice for the salvation of mankind.

If the Holy Ghost poured into this admirable Mother's Heart torrents of almost infinite grace to render her worthy of giving Him birth, what must He have done to dispose her to sacrifice her beloved Son in spite of so great sorrow and love? We can certainly state that as her Heart was then turned into an immense sea of sorrow, so did it also become an unfathomable and boundless; ocean of grace and holiness.

Who could conceive the almost infinite abundance of graces that filled the loving heart of the Mother of the Crucified Saviour when He visited her after His Resurrection? Measure, if you can, the extremity of this desolate Mother's sorrow when she beheld her Beloved Son actually die amid frightful torments, and you will understand the immense graces she thus merited, which Jesus Christ bestowed upon her after His Resurrection and on the day of His Ascension.

What treasures of grace enriched the most holy Heart of the Mother of God through the divine Sacrifice of the Altar at which she daily assisted with unutterable devotion, and by her daily communions made with inconceivable love during the fifteen years she remained on earth after her Son's Ascension!

After all this, be not surprised if I say that the Blessed Virgin's Heart is an mean of grace, and if the mouthpieces of the Holy Ghost proclaim the grace of this glorious Virgin to be immense, even as the capacity of her Heart. "The grace of the Holy Virgin is immense," says St. Epiphanius. (3) "When I desire to contemplate the immensity of thy grace and of thy glory, my mind fails me and my tongue is dumb;' writes St. Anselm. (4) "The sacred Virgin is a treasure of life and all immense abyss of grace;' exclaims St. John Damascene. (5) "The grace wherewith Mary was filled," asserts St. Bonaventure, "was certainly an immense grace. For an immense vessel cannot be filled unless its contents are likewise immense. Now Mary is a most immense vessel, having contained Him whom the Heavens cannot contain. If she encompassed God in her bosom, how much more truly in her Heart? And if the immense capacity of her Heart was filled with grace, we must necessarily conclude that the grace which filled such a capacity was itself immense." (6)

Immense and eternal thanks be to the sovereign Author of grace, who (3) Gratia sanctae Virginis est immensa. in orat. de laud. Virg. (4). Immensitatem gratiae tuae et gloriae, considerare cupienti, 0 Virgo, sensus deficit, lingua fatiscit. Lib. de Excell. Virg. (5). Virgo, vitae thesaurus, gratiae abyssus immensa. Orat. 2 de dom. Virg. (6). Specul. B.V. Lect. 5.

gave His blessed Mother so great and vast a Heart and filled it with such riches that it became an mean of grace and a sea of blessings for all true children of her most sweet and loving Heard 0 Admirable Heart, thou wast ever closed to sin of every kind and filled with the highest sanctity of which a human heart is capable; behold I now offer thee my heart. Deign to take full and eternal possession of i t , suffer not that anything displeasing to God may enter my heart but implore His Divine Majesty to establish in it the perfect reign of His grace and of His love.

Not only is the admirable Heart of the Saviour's Mother an ocean of grace, containing and almost infinitely surpassing all the graces of the Church, Triumphant and Militant, but it is also their Source and origin. As the Eternal Father chose Mary from all eternity that through her we might receive Him who is the first author and principle of all grace, so did God likewise choose her, that through His handmaid we might receive all the graces proceeding from that first source. As God deigned to give us a Saviour only with the holy Virgin's consent, so also did He eternally decree to grant my gift or grace only through Mary. "God wishes us to have everything through Mary's hands," says St. Bernard. (7) "None is saved but through thee, 0 holy Virgin," Says St. Germanus of Constantinople. "None is delivered from evil but through thee; through thee alone do all receive the gifts and grace of God." (8) a Hence does the Church salute and invoke her as Mother of grace: Maria Mater gradae. "it is no wonder," exclaims St. Bonaventure, "that the graces of all the saints overflow in Mary as the rivers flow into the sea, for the grace of graces was to be communicated to the whole Church by her, according to the Saying of St. Augustine: 'Thou art full of grace, 0 Mary, of the grace thou didst find in the Bosom of God , which thou wast found worthy to spread over the whole earth.' " (9)

Finally, St. Bernard,(10) St. Fulgentius,(11) St. Bonaventure,(12) and many other Fathers agree that it was necessary for the Mother of our Saviour to contain in herself all graces necessary and useful for her state, because every grace is given to men through her intercession. (7). Nihil not Deus habere voluit quod per Mariae manus non transiret. Serm. de Nativ. B. Virg. (8). Nullus est qui salvus fiat, 0 Sanctissima, nisi per te: nemo est qui liberetur a malis, nisi per te, o purissima; nemo est cui donum concedatur, nisi per te, a charissima. Specul. B.M.V. Lect. 3. (9). Quid mirum est si ommis gratia in Mariam confluxit, per quam tanta gratia ad omnes defluxit? Ait enim, Augustinus. Gratia es plena, Maria, etc. (10). In Serm. de Aquae ductu. (11). In Serm. de laud. Mar. (12). In Spec. lect. 3.

0 my God, how admirable is thy goodness towards the children of men! Under what obligation are we to serve Thee, to praise Thee and to love Thee in return for all the abundant and most excellent graces wherewith Thou hast enriched the glorious Virgin! We are as much compelled to gratitude as i f Thou hadst granted these graces to each one of us in particular, for Thou didst give them to Mary, not for herself alone, but for each one of us, that she might be made worthy to become the Mother of the Only-begotten Son, and to give Him to us as our saviour, our brother, our father, our head, our soul, our heart, our life and our all. May Heaven and earth and every creature therein, bless, praise Rod glorify thee for ever!

0 Mother of perfect grace, thou wast the woman chosen to find the grace that all mankind had so unhappily lost. Through thee the God of grace and goodness restored to us what we had lost. To thee, after Jesus Thy Divine Son, must we have recourse in order to find the graces we need to serve Him and to assure our own salvation. Thy maternal Heart is the treasure and the treasurer of all these graces. In thy most loving and ardent Heart we cannot fail to find them. Hence dare we Say to dice, with the beloved of thy Heart, St. Bernard: "0 Mother of mercy, open the door of thy most tender Heart to the prayers and sighs of the children of Adam, thou who dost not despise the sinner however horrible his condition, if he but cry to thee and implore thy aid with a penitent and contrite heart." (13)

(13). Aperi itaque tu, Mater misericordiae, benignissimi Cordis tui januam suspiosis precatibus filiorum Adam ... Tu peccatorem, quantumlibet foetidum, non horres, non despicis, si ad te suspiraverit, tuamque interventum poenitenti corde flagitaverit. In Deprec. BY. 222-