Praise be to Jesus and Mary, now and forever.
Just continuing our reflections today on Our Lady and her role in Franciscan spirituality.
Today we'll speak briefly about our spiritual walk with Mary.
Franciscan spirituality teaches that the search for Jesus himself is vain and fruitless if that search doesn't go through Our Lady, because you can't enter into the mystery of Jesus forgetting that he's the Son of Mary, and we know that no one has penetrated the mystery of Christ as much as she has.
On the heels of St. Francis, the Franciscans have always insisted on Our Lady's importance in the spiritual life.
Their thought on this point is really in continuity with the ideal of St. Bernard of Clairvaux.
St. Bernard, whom we actually talked about towards the beginning of our series of lectures.
But the Sons of St. Francis have studied more in-depth the motives of this devotion and have organically developed a solid theological doctrine concerning it.
From prayer, from meditation, from reading, and study, comes a devotion to Mary that's both founded on the dogmas of who she is, and it's a devotion that also carries with it a lot of tender affection towards her, as well.
St. Francis, St. Bonaventure, Blessed John Don Scotus, St. Bernardine of Siena, and other Franciscans.
In their preachings and in their writings on Our Lady, they really anticipated many of what we would call the modern Mariological conquests the Church has proclaimed in the last few centuries, like Her Immaculate Conception, Her Assumption, Her Universal Mediation.
St. Bonaventure on this point says, if we want to find Christ, we must first draw near to Mary.
The Lord doesn't welcome anyone except by her mediation, says the Seraphic Doctor.
Just as dogmatic Christocentrism includes Mary with Christ and sees her beside Our Lord, who is the center of the universe and the universal mediator, so too spiritual Christocentrism can't exclude Our Lady.
In our interior life, she has to have the same place as she has in the designs of God in God's plan, so her place in our lives shouldn't be marginal or optional or something that we just substitute with other devotions.
The Seraphic Soul contemplates what we call the prerogatives or the privileges of the Virgin.
They see her as the collaborator alongside Christ, associated to the mission of her Son by that one eternal decree of God and working with Him to carry out God's divine plan.
The Seraphic Soul places their heart at the feet of Our Lady in order to awaken the fire of the love of Christ in their heart and to run quickly in the way of perfection.
The Franciscan Soul honors Mary with a very special veneration, a veneration that's inspired by divine revelation and which follows the teachings and the devotions of the Church.
They venerate her for her great dignity as the creature most full of grace, as we hear in Luke 1:28, as the one who is blessed among women, Luke 1:42, and Mother of the Lord, Luke 1:43, who, as St. Francis says, made our brother the Lord of Majesty.
And the Franciscan heart loves Mary with a tender love, a love which is concrete and full of trust.
They know that Mary is the mother, that not only gave supernatural birth to us, but as a true mother, she also protects and nourishes the spiritual life within us so that we can become more like Jesus, who, as St. Luke himself says, Jesus grew in age and wisdom and grace before God and before men, all under the eyes and under the protection of Our Lady, Luke 2, verse 52.
The Franciscan heart knows that union with Mary is a guarantee of supernatural fruitfulness because she is the spouse of the sanctifier, the spouse of the Holy Spirit, as St. Francis teaches.
And the formation of Christ in the members of the mystical body is the work of the Holy Spirit in collaboration with Mary.
Knowing this, the Seraphic soul entrusts to Mary their own spiritual progress and all their good works and the works of the apostolate.
They also cultivate a grateful love towards her, remembering all that she suffered for us in union with her Son.
And living beside her, they entrust themselves to her in order to conform themselves more to Christ.
As St. Paul says, completing what is lacking in Christ's afflictions for the sake of his body, the Church, Colossians 1, verse 24.
The Franciscan spirit also studies to imitate Mary, the one whose face, as Dante says, most resembles the face of Christ.
She's our perfect model, but she's also accessible because she's fully human and she's truly our mother.
She's the greatest of all, but that also means that she's the nearest of all to us, too.
That's part of her greatness, is her nearness.
The Franciscan heart tries to imitate her virtues and imitate her in their embracing Jesus' Incarnation, their embracing his humility, and his pure and loving adherence to the will of God.
With a humble heart, the child of Mary listens to her words, do whatever Jesus tells you, John 2, verse 5.
They take those words to heart and put Jesus' commandments into practice.
And lastly, the seraphic heart calls on Mary with unlimited trust, knowing that she's the dispenser of all graces and knowing that she can and wants to help her children.
Because as St. Leonard of Port Maurice says, she's the most loving creature and the creature most loved by God.
The seraphic soul calls on her in good times and in bad times, especially when temptation knocks at our door and when loneliness or pain envelops our heart and our bodies as well.
As St. Bernadine of Siena says so simply, he says, entrust yourself to her and don't fear in your afflictions and infirmities because our Virgin Mary has compassion on you.
And we call on her at the hour of our death with the simplicity of a child who closes his eyes when he's about to go to sleep and abandons himself into the arms of his loving mother.
St. Bonaventure says, let's not move far away from her, but let's cast ourselves at her feet, greeting her always saying hail full of grace so that by means of her who found grace and mercy above all women, we too can find grace and mercy.
And the Franciscan Bartolomeo of Pisa adds, from her came the salvation of all.
Going close to her, we arrive not only at God's grace, but also we arrive at the glory of Jesus Christ who is the joy, beatitude, and the delight of all the saints.
So in our spiritual life, let's go very, very close to Our Lady so that she can help us to become more the children that we were created to be, so she can help us to become more like her beloved son, Jesus, every day.
Praise be Jesus and Mary, now and forever.