Margaret Mary receives the First Great Revelation
When Our Lord spoke to Margaret Mary through “interior locutions,” He would bid her to ponder (as Mother Mary before her) on the Wound in His Side. Although all His Wounds brought deep sorrow to Margaret Mary, it was this Wound, this wounded Heart, pierced by Longinus’7 sword which caused her the greatest pain. I wonder if this was not the greatest Wound, the greatest hurt Our Lord suffered, not so much from the sword (as He was already dead) but the pain to His Heart through the rejection of His children. [It reminds us of the time, Our Lord appeared to John of the Woods in Bois Signeur Isaac, His Body covered with welts, bruises, and open bleeding cuts. “(His) Eyes pierced (Lord Isaac’s) eyes... Finally He spoke, “Look how they have mistreated Me.”8] When Our Lord Jesus showed His Precious Heart, pierced out of love for us, was He preparing Margaret Mary for His mandate: “Tell My children they can soothe My Wounded Heart, through renewed devotion to My Sacred Heart?” Although devotion to the Sacred Heart was not new to the Church, existing in some form or another, many Saints meditating on Our Lord’s Sacred Heart, the Lord chose Margaret Mary to promote this devotion in a way which would touch the hearts of all the faithful. He desired, it become an official devotion throughout His Church, throughout the world, for all time in memoriam.Up until this time Our Lord had made His will and presence known to Margaret Mary interiorly, but that was to change December 27, 1673. Margaret Mary was twenty-six years old. She had been professed for almost fourteen months. Her job in the Infirmary brought her nothing but rejection, insults and adversity. Her only solace was on her knees, her body pressed against the grill, as close to the Blessed Sacrament as she could get. She found herself enveloped by Our Lord’s heavenly presence. “He opened His Heart” to her “for the first time.” He said,“My Divine Heart so passionately loves all men and you in particular that, no longer able to contain the flame of its burning charity (love), it has to pour forth through you, and it must manifest itself to them, to enrich them with its precious treasures, which I am revealing to you, and which contains the sanctifying and salutary graces necessary to snatch them away from the abyss of perdition (sin). And I have chosen you as an abyss of unworthiness and ignorance for the fulfillment of this great plan, so that everything may be accomplished by Me alone.”“After that, He asked me to give Him my heart, which I begged Him to take, and this He did. He placed it within His own adorable Heart, in which He made me see my heart as a tiny atom being consumed in this flaming furnace, and then, drawing it out like an intense flame in the form of a heart, He put it back where he had taken it, saying to me: ‘Beloved, here is a precious pledge of My Love, which implants in your side a tiny spark of its most intense flames, so as to serve as your heart and consume you until the last moment;....its intensity will not die out or find refreshment except to a small degree in bloodletting,9 which I shall mark so completely with the Blood of My Cross,....it will bring you more humiliation and suffering than relief. That is why I want (you) to practice what is commanded of you by the rule, so as to give you the consolation of shedding your blood on the cross of humiliations. Although I have closed the wound in your side, you will feel the pain of it forever, and although you have taken only the name of My slave, I now call you the beloved disciple of My Sacred Heart.’”With this revelation of her future mission, Jesus made it plain to Margaret Mary that He had chosen her, but to save her from any slight possibility of pride in Him having chosen her, He revealed she was totally unworthy and ignorant. We hear again the message of Saint Bernadette when she said if the Blessed Mother could have found someone less worthy and more stupid, she would have chosen her instead of Bernadette.
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