Many Catholics are unaware of our holy traditions on and powerful devotions to the Sorrows of Mary. Based on Scripture and the lives of the Saints, this little book will open eyes and hearts to the Sorrows of Our Lady.
How can joy and sorrow go together? After all, you usually don't find grieving widows laughing, nor newlyweds weeping. Joy and sorrow are so far removed from each other on the spectrum of human emotion that it seems illogical to stick them together. Yet there is a deep mystery here to unlock... Your life has sorrows. You are meant for joy. Facing the reality of sorrow, we can either live in denial of the pain or dig deeper for meaning... and joy. In contemplating the seven sorrows of the Mother of Jesus, we can discover what so many Christians over the centuries have found: in Mary's sorrows we find a model of faith and how to discover happiness in the midst of suffering. A way to transform sadness into gladness? That is revolutionary! Discovering Mary's method for converting sorrow to joy may just be the single most important step in your spiritual life. Launch into these pages and begin your journey to joy: to the meaning, peace, and happiness for which you thirst.
Devotion to Our Lady's Seven Sorrows has its roots deep in Sacred Scripture, Catholic tradition, and the revelations of Jesus and his Blessed Mother to St. Bridget of Sweden (1303-1373). The Blessed Mother not only suffered interiorly throughout her Son's life on earth, but after he ascended into heaven, as well. The devotion to her Seven Sorrows is directed toward seven poignant moments in the lives of Jesus and Mary. Here are some of those moments in poetry.
A unique little prayerbook of powerful prayers and devotions, including wonderful promises attached that were made by Our Lord or Our Lady, most of which were revealed to various famous Saints. Includes devotions to Our Lady, the Infant Jesus, Precious Blood, Sacred Heart, Divine Mercy, St. Michael, etc. Shows that God wants to grant us favors--if we will just pray!
A masterpiece that combines the visions of four great Catholic mystics into one coherent story on the life of the Blessed Virgin Mary. Based primarily on the famous revelations of Ven. Anne Catherine Emmerich and Ven. Mary of Agreda, it also includes many episodes described in the writings of St. Bridget of Sweden and St. Elizabeth of Schenau. To read this book, therefore, is to share in the magnificent visions granted to four of the most priviledged souls in the history of the Church. In complete harmony with the Gospel story, this book reads like a masterfully written novel. It includes such fascinating details as the birth and infancy of Mary, her espousal to St. Joseph and her Assumption into Heaven where she was crowned Queen of Heaven and Earth. For young and old alike, The Life of Mary As Seen by the Mystics will forever impress the reader with an inspiring and truly unforgettable understanding of the otherwise unknown facts concerning Mary and the Holy Family.
WHO can have a heart so hard that it will not melt on hearing of a most lamentable event which once happened in the world? There was a noble and holy mother who had but one only Son; and he was the most amiable that could be imagined, innocent, virtuous, beautiful, and most loving towards his mother; so much so, that he never had caused her the least displeasure, but always had showed her all respect, obedience, and affection. Hence the mother had placed on this Son all her earthly affections. Now what happened? It happened that this Son, through envy, was falsely accused by his enemies and the judge, although he knew and confessed his innocence, yet, that he might not offend his enemies, condemned him to an infamous death, precisely as they had requested him to do. And this poor mother had to suffer the affliction of seeing that amiable and beloved Son so unjustly taken from her, in the flower of his age, by a barbarous death; for he was made to die in torment, drained of his blood before her own eyes in a public place, upon an infamous cross. Devout souls, what do you say? Is this case and this unhappy mother worthy of compassion? Already you know of whom I speak. This Son so cruelly slain was our loving Redeemer, Jesus, and his mother was the Blessed Virgin Mary, who, for love of us, was willing to see him offered up to the divine justice by the barbarity of men. This great pain, then, which Mary suffered for us a pain which was more than a thousand deaths, merits our compassion and gratitude. And if we can return nothing else for so much love, at least let us for a little time today stop to consider the severity of the suffering by which Mary became queen of martyrs; for her great martyrdom exceeded in suffering that of all the martyrs being, in the first place the longest martyrdom; and in the second place, the greatest martyrdom. This comes mainly from 'The Glories of Mary' by Saint Alphonsus Ligouri with additions from the Raccolta and other pious sources at the end.
What better gift could Our Lady have given us than the Rosary? The Rosary is Sacred Braille in that it is a miraculous juxtaposition of a language of prayer we can feel with our hands, joining word to touch. It is the Rosary to which our fingers may cling, as our flesh craves something tangible. The decades of the Rosary can be thought about, and, quite literally, felt, at the same time. While contemporary society separates the idea of "thinking" and "feeling," Scripture unites all functions in the heart. If we meditate on the words, "Mary treasured up all these things and pondered them in her heart," (Lk 2:19) the thinking and feeling functions are joined. The Rosary, through engaging both thought and touch, unites our spiritual and physical natures; our thinking and feeling faculties.
A Rosary of the Seven Sorrows of Our Lady is a guided journey with Fr. Frederick Faber in his own words. The reader walks step by step, prayer by prayer beside the Blessed Virgin Mary through each of her Sorrows as the Mother of God. This text-based rosary comes alive through excerpts taken directly from Fr. Faber's 400-plus page treatise, The Foot of the Cross, The Sorrows of Mary, written in the 1850s. Fr. Faber was the English theologian who translated St. Louis de Montfort's, True Devotion to Mary into English. If you desire to deepen your relationship with the sorrowful Mother, this collection of pearls from Fr. Faber's mystical teaching is a good start. Now with the Daily Meditation to honor Our Sorrowful Mother as she requested.
"A profound and lively reflection on the seven joys of Mary: the Annunciation, the Nativity, the Epiphany, the Resurrection, the Ascension, Pentecost, and the Assumption"--P. [4] of cover.