As Mary,
we offer our life to Christ the Lord
November 21st, 2020
Meditation of the Day by Pontiff Samuel
(Draft)
In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.
Today we live the Feast of the Presentation of Mary Most Holy to the Temple. She who, at the age of three, was taken to the Temple by her parents Joachim and Anne and consecrated to the Lord.
Saint Anne and Saint Joachim, who were unable to have children, kept their vow to the Lord in this way. Anne promised indeed that if the Lord would have granted her the grace, she would have consecrated the fruit of her womb to Him. The Lord granted Anne the grace, and Anne and Joachim offered their only daughter to the Lord, presenting her in the Temple to be instructed and consecrated.
At that moment, thanks to the faith of those Holy Parents, She who has been called since ever to be the Temple of the Most High, was presented to the Temple to be instructed, even humanly, on the Holy Law of God’s Love. Mary, She who was conceived in the Father’s Heart, She who was generated by the Infinite Love of God before time was, the Immaculate of the Holy Spirit, was accompanied by Her human parents, Saints Joachim and Anne, on that day in the time of men, so that She could climb the steps of that Temple on Her own, advancing and ascending towards the Mystery of God, which the Father, day after day, through the work of the Holy Spirit, daily revealed to Her.
For all of us, sons of Mary, She is the example in everything and for everything.
So it has been since Her prodigious and Holy birth, which took place thanks to the Holy Spirit, so that each one of us, on Her example, through the work of the Holy Spirit, may now be reborn from Above, in Jesus and in Mary, and offer our life, our daily life to the Heavenly Father, like Mary did, forsaking all that is worldly to thus spiritually ascend the steps of the Temple of God, which is Mary, Mother Church, New Jerusalem, the Metaphysical Dwelling that welcomes into her womb all those who want to be and to remain sons of God in Christ Jesus, daily offering every moment of their lives to the Father in order to take part in His Love made Person, and thus to win in His Holy Name.
This is the path that from now on we are all called to undertake every day on the example of Mary, who since childhood offered her life to the Father, without looking back, without tears and without human regrets for what she was leaving behind. So did Her holy parents, Anne and Joachim, who even in their old age, although humanly on their own, joyfully offered their Everything to the Lord, without regrets, without nostalgia, but praising and thanking the Lord; and great was the grace and the reward that the Father bestowed on them, because God is very generous towards those who offer their life and to those who offer their everything out of love.
Here is our call. Here is our presentation to this Living Temple of God’s Love. Here is our rebirth today, after having forsaken all that is worldly to ascend this Holy Staircase, the Golden Stairway witnessed by the Patriarch Jacob, that Stairway that joins Heaven and earth. Great is the reward of Heaven for those who, following Mary’s example, leave everything for love of the Lord: parents, children, friends, homes, work, comforts, human appreciation and honours. When everything is left behind for God, so then everything will come with even greater abundance.
Those who love God as the only supreme Good, leave everything and offer everything without regrets or complaints, but renew every day their ‘yes’ to the call received, offering everything with love, just as Mary did since the day she was presented in the Temple after her birth. Behold Mary! Behold She who is the Teacher of strength, love and constancy for all of us; She who daily gives us the will and perseverance to move forward without ever looking back.
To all of you, dear brothers, dear sisters, dear friends, with all my heart I say: pray to Mary, invoke Her Holy Name and nothing the evil can do against you, nothing the children of the evil one can do against you, nothing temptation can do against you, nothing the trial can do against you; nourish yourselves every day with all that is Spirit, do not let the anguish and difficulties of the world overwhelm you.
Only by daily nourishing your soul with the Holy Spirit, who is Person, will you become ever stronger inwardly in order to become ever stronger outwardly. Nourishing yourself every day with what is Spirit means not thinking about human things, for most of the time you have, but means welcoming all the new things you can do with prayer and with the spirit held high, hallmark of those who live on this earth wanting spiritually to remain in Heaven, to live Heaven, to live and remain in communion of heart, of soul and spirit with the Son of God.
Heaven is what awaits us even now and for eternity. This is the reward of God’s sons. This is the reward of those who, like Mary, have offered their lives for love of the Lord. This is the reward of those who leave everything to embrace the Abode of God, to embrace the living Temple of God’s Love, which is Mary, to embrace the Love made Person, who is Christ the Lord.
Here is the reward. Here is Heaven on earth, which in the New Jerusalem already is, in the awaiting for the fulfilment of everything for eternity. Heaven is not a sensation or a dimension or an imaginary place, it is reality, the most beautiful reality, just as hell is not a place or an imaginary evil, it is reality, the saddest, the nastiest.
Those who accept the Son of God generated in the Spirit by Mary, will be saved; those who continue to despise the Son of God, to blaspheme the Holy Spirit, will not be saved.
This is the Word of the Lord that will not pass until it is fulfilled.
In the name of the Father, and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.