The first aspect of this series, which I began in the last post, has to do with the death of the ego and the purification of the spirit.
Now, some of you may be wondering how Mary, who is perfect, can teach those of us who are imperfect about perfection.
This question indicates that we do not understand that Our Lady truly suffered with Christ in the Passion. What has participating in the Passion have to do with the death of the ego?
Mary's will was so united to that of Christ that she willed the manner in which God chose to redeem mankind. She did not cling to anything, any false emotion, or false hope that God would intervene and stop the Passion.
She, in fact, encouraged Christ to walk the Via Dolorosa. The Wedding Feast of Cana was the turning point, not only inaugurating Christ's mission, but beginning the walk to Calvary. This is what Christ meant by referring to Mary as "Woman". From the moment of the miracle at the Wedding Feast of Cana, Mary becomes the universal Mother of us all.
She is also called Mother at the foot of the Cross. The Woman is the universal symbol of all who suffer. She is the one, who although pure, endures the suffering of Christ, Her Son, with Him. She shows us complete humility.
But, she is not alone at the foot of the Cross. Christ gives her to John and John to her. The message for us is that we really need strong, solid, Catholic friends, real brothers and sisters in Christ, to help us endure purification.
Mary's great humility is our guide. She is far above us, but she shows us the way. I have come to the conclusion that one needs to ask Our Lady for help in the purification of the spirit. She alone among all humans (besides Christ, of course) experiences perfect humility and the absence of self-love and egotism.
Here is Garrigou-Lagrange again on this level of purification, wherein we need to ask Mary for help.
This passive purification will certainly not be without suffering, and, as St. John of the Cross teaches, it will even be a mystical death, the death to self, the disintegration of self-love, which until then has resisted grace, at times with great obstinacy. Here pride must receive the deathblow that it may give place to genuine humility, a virtue which has been compared to the deepest root of a tree, a root which buries itself so much the more deeply in the soil as the loftiest branch, the symbol of charity, rises higher toward the sky.
This center of the soul, the refuge of personal judgment and selflove that is often very subtle, must be illumined by the divine light and filled by God, rendered completely healthy, and vivified. On the feast of the Purification, at Mass and in the procession each person carries a lighted candle, the symbol of the light of life that each should bear in the innermost depths of his soul. This light of life was given to man on the first day of creation; extinguished by sin, it was rekindled by the grace of conversion and by the hope of the promised Redeemer. This light grew in the souls of the patriarchs and the prophets until the coming of Christ, "a light to the revelation of the Gentiles, and the glory of . . . Israel," as the aged Simeon said in his beautiful canticle, Nunc dimittis, on the occasion of the presentation of Jesus in the Temple.
This same light of life, which grew in humanity until the advent of the Messias, should also grow in each of our souls from baptism until our entrance into heaven. It should gradually illumine and vivify the very center of our intellect and our heart that this depth may be not an obscure depth of egoism, personal judgment, and resistance to grace, but a depth of light and goodness where the Holy Ghost, the source of living water springing up into eternal life, may reign increasingly.
From what we have just said it is evident that the passive purification of the spirit, made necessary by the defects of proficients, is the decisive struggle between two spirits: the spirit of pride, which may grow even to blasphemy, to hatred of God, and despair, and that of humility and charity, which is eternal life begun in us. These two conflicting spirits may be symbolized by two trees, one of which illustrates the teaching of St. Gregory the Great and St. Thomas on the roots and results of the seven capital sins, while the other explains their doctrine on humility and charity, and the connection of these virtues with the other virtues and the seven gifts.
Mary is our guide because she willed suffering. She did not have to suffer with Christ, but God asked her to do so, supporting Christ along the way of sorrow. Because she experienced death in Christ, we can ask her to help us.
to be continued....
