Saturday, October 16, 2010

Saint Margaret Mary Alacoque

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"When Christ appeared to Margaret Mary and revealed His infinite charity to her, He also let her perceive a kind of sadness in Him in His complaints against the countless and grievous insults He suffered by reason of men's ingratitude.  May the words He then spoke become firmly engraved in the souls of the faithful and never be erased!" - Pope Pius XI in his Encyclical Miserentissimus Redemptor
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"This sovereign Spirit that operated and acted in me independently of me, had seized such absolute control over my whole spiritual and even bodily being that it was no longer in my power to command any feeling of joy or sadness except at His good pleasure; nor could I focus my mind on anything except what He presented to it." - St. Margaret Mary Alacoque

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"Truthfully, my dear Mother, I don't know what to say to those I love, unless I speak to them of the cross of Jesus Christ, and when I am asked what graces our Lord grants me, an unworthy sinner, I can only speak of the happiness there is in suffering with Jesus Christ, for I see nothing more precious in this life, for those who love Him, than to suffer for love of Him." - From the Letters of St. Margaret Mary Alacoque

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"O my dear Mother, if its true value were known, everyone would not flee from it and reject it so freely; but on the contrary, it would be so greatly cherished and loved that everyone could find happiness only in the cross, and rest only on the cross, and would have no other wish than to die in His arms, scorned and abandoned by all." - From the Letters of St. Margaret Mary Alacoque

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"All my prayers and everything I can do seem to be directed toward this goal alone, to establish reign of the Sacred Heart; and now to obtain the approbation of the request you have made to Rome on this matter.  I am not failing to ask the most sacred Virgin and our blessed Father La Colombiere to take an interest in it, and I hope he will be of very great help to us.  For, just as you are taking his place on earth, I think he also is taking yours in heaven to love and glorify this divine heart." - St. Margaret Mary Alacoque

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"Finally my dear Mother, it is consoling to hear the successful progress of this beautiful devotion.  (Note from me: Devotion to the Sacred Heart of Jesus)  We are informed from Lyons that it is like a Miracle to see how everyone is embracing it with fervor and eagerness.  Three or four cities have been mentioned to us where these books are going to be printed, including Marseilles.  And a thousand have been taken for that one place.  And of twenty-seven religious houses in that city, there is not one that has not accepted this devotion, and they have been so eager that some of them have erected altars, others are dedicating chapels to it; and as soon as the people of Marseilles heard about it, they urged their preachers to give them exhortations to thoroughly explain this devotion to them, which, in less than two weeks, spread so rapidly that an unbelievable number of devout persons receive Holy Communion every first Friday. And it has been said that it is going to be established in all the houses of the reverend Jesuit Fathers, who even have the young fathers who do not say Mass receive Communion every first Friday..." St. Margaret Mary Alacoque
Stained Glass Window -Sacred Heart Church, Honolulu
 Photo by Esther G.

Excerpts from Saint Margaret Mary by Msgr. Leon Cristani,  St. Paul Editions

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