Introduction to the Week of Knowledge of Jesus Christ
The ultimate culmination of Marian consecration according to the model of Saint Louis de Montfort is really consecration to Jesus Christ. It is a total consecration to Jesus Christ through Mary. For this reason our journey of preparation concludes with a week focused on Jesus Christ. He is, after all, the Alpha and the Omega, the beginning and the end. He is our Savior and Lord. Saint Louis de Montfort simply intuited that a sweet and easy path to total consecration to Jesus Christ would be through Mary. As we have already been meditating, that total consecration happens particularly through the womb of Mary. That is where the God-man was formed and so that is where the “man-gods” can be formed. Jesus Christ is God by nature, but He makes us a sharer in His divinity, i.e. “God” by grace. That process of divinization is gradual and the mold is the womb of Mary. So we enter into the womb of Mary not simply out of love for Mary, but also in order to be transformed into Christ her Son.
As we have focused on throughout this preparation, a major obstacle for us is the disordered thoughts and desires of original sin, which fundamentally tempt us to try to become god without God. We seek control and self-sufficiency. We want to depend on God only insofar as it moves us to a point that we no longer need to depend on Him. We do the same with others. We are resistant to entering into truly interdependent relationships that are committed and eternal. Because of the wounds of broken trust, we always keep escape routes open in case things do not work out. Total consecration to Jesus Christ is a decision to close the escape routes in our relationship with God. It is a total consecration, involving our whole mind, heart, body and soul. It is a radical decision to enter irrevocably into a love relationship with Him starting in this moment and including all future moments as well, in time and in eternity.
We make this total consecration through Mary and as we place ourselves in her womb, we let ourselves develop the qualities of Jesus Christ her Son. We need to develop especially the counter-cultural qualities that reverse the pattern of original sin. These are qualities of trust and dependency on God. We develop this trust through prayer and we develop it also through our interdependent relationships with others. Interdependency with others is part of the life of Jesus. He placed His life in the hands of others, starting with Mary and Joseph and extending to His Apostles and disciples. He placed His life so radically in their hands that He gave them power to take His life away, and even when they betrayed Him, He never took away His trust and love. These are the heights we are called to.
In this Week of Knowledge of Jesus Christ, we focus on the way that Jesus became poor, little, weak and dependent. We focus on His powerlessness in His earthly life and His dependency on others and we focus on His ongoing powerlessness in the Eucharist and the dependency and trust that He still gives to us in our response to His Eucharistic Presence. We also focus on the illumination He brings us in the Resurrection and ultimately the way He made Himself subject to death. After each day’s meditation we pray a Litany of Powerlessness, focusing on the way that Jesus who always had the power of God truly emptied Himself and subjected Himself to our human limitations, becoming powerless like us. We pray that we might lovingly embrace His powerlessness and find all the power we need through our trust in God. We pray also a litany of Jesus living in the womb of Mary, deepening our reflection on how He “consecrated” Himself to Mary in this way, allowing Himself to be formed in her womb. Thirdly, we meditate, through Saint Thomas Aquinas’s Prayer Before Communion, on the humility of Jesus in His Eucharistic Presence. If it is possible, it would be an excellent final preparation to attend Mass each day this week and offer that Prayer of Saint Thomas before Communion in the context of the Mass. And lastly we continue our prayer of Entrustment to the Womb of Mary. Let us also ask the Divine Artisan, the Holy Spirit to form us and lead us deeper in our journey throughout this week.
Day 27 – Jesus is little, near and real
From the Book of the Prophet of Isaiah:
Thus says the Lord:
Heaven is my throne
and the earth is my footstool;
what is the house which you would build for me,
and what is the place of my rest?
All these things my hand has made,
and so all these things are mine,
says the Lord.
But this is the man to whom I will look,
he that is humble and contrite in spirit,
and trembles at my word. (Is 66:1-2)
From Pope Francis’s Homily in Czestochowa, July 28, 2016:
God saves us, then by making himself little, near and real. First God makes himself little. The Lord, who is “meek and humble of heart” (Mt 11:29), especially loves the little ones, to whom the kingdom of God is revealed (Mt 11:25); they are great in his eyes and he looks to them (cf. Is 66:2). He especially loves them because they are opposed to the “pride of life” that belongs to the world (cf. 1 Jn 2:16). The little ones speak his own language, that of the humble love that brings freedom. So he calls the simple and receptive to be his spokespersons; he entrusts to them the revelation of his name and the secrets of his heart. Our minds turn to so many sons and daughters of your own people, like the martyrs made the defenseless power of the Gospel shine forth, like those ordinary yet remarkable people who bore witness to the Lord’s love amid great trials, and those meek and powerful heralds of mercy who were Saint John Paul II and Saint Faustina. Through these “channels” of his love, the Lord has granted priceless gifts to the whole Church and to all mankind. It is significant that this anniversary of the baptism of your people exactly coincides with the Jubilee of mercy.
Then too, God is near, his kingdom is at hand (cf. Mk 1:15). The Lord does not want to be feared like a powerful and aloof sovereign. He does not want to remain on his throne in heaven or in history books, but loves to come down to our everyday affairs, to walk with us. As we think of the gift of a millennium so filled with faith, we do well before all else to thank God for having walked with your people, having taken you by the hand, as a father takes the hand of his child, and accompanied you in so many situations. That is what we too, in the Church, are constantly called to do: to listen, to get involved and be neighbours, sharing in people’s joys and struggles, so that the Gospel can spread every more consistently and fruitfully: radiating goodness through the transparency of our lives.
Finally, God is real. Today’s readings make it clear that everything about God’s way of acting is real and concrete. Divine wisdom “is like a master worker” and “plays” (cf. Prov 8:30). The Word becomes flesh, is born of a mother, is born under the law (cf. Gal4:4), has friends and goes to a party. The eternal is communicated by spending time with people and in concrete situations. Your own history, shaped by the Gospel, the Cross and fidelity to the Church, has seen the contagious power of a genuine faith, passed down from family to family, from fathers to sons and above all from mothers and grandmothers, whom we need so much to thank. In particular, you have been able to touch with your hand the real and provident tenderness of the Mother of all, whom I have come here as a pilgrim to venerate and whom we have acclaimed in the Psalm as the “great pride of our nation” (Jud15:9).
Reflection:
“The little ones speak his own language…” and we can imagine how twin babies communicate in such a simple way in the womb or how a baby in the womb communicates so simply with his mother. The language of love is always simple—gestures of tenderness, embraces, a mother feeding her baby with her body, a mother holding her baby in her arms. This is the first language that Jesus spoke—a language of touch, of food, of kisses and embraces. And it is the last language that He and we speak in our last moments of life. Likewise, if we let ourselves be little, we can feel the nearness of Jesus who draws close to our weakness to bring the tender touch of the Father and the realness of Jesus who does not settle for ideas, but turns them into gestures of love. All this happens when we allow ourselves to be little and enfolded in the love of Mary’s womb.
Litany of the Powerlessness of Jesus
Litany of Christ Living in the Womb of Mary
Prayer of St Thomas Aquinas before Holy Communion
Prayer of Entrustment to the Womb of Mary