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Day #16: Renouncing the Demon

THE SOUL: I know that in holy Baptism I renounced the demon and I?m happy with that renunciation. (more…)

Day #15: The Spirit of Jesus Christ

MARY: Opposed to the spirit of the world, which is a mass of duplicity, resentment, struggles, presumption and degradation, is the spirit of Jesus Christ, (more…)

Day #14: The Spirit of the World

MARY: You live in the world and you cannot withdraw yourself from it materially, but you must be there
without living in its spirit. (more…)

Day #13: Holy Baptism

MARY: The grace of God has enriched you from your birth. (more…)

Day #12: The Channels of Grace

MARY: In his mercy God did not want to make the flow of his grace to you difficult and he gave you a channel through which you can enrich yourself with it in the holy sacraments. (more…)

Day #11: Mary’s Grace

THE SOUL: Hail, O Mary, full of grace! … From the wretched earth where I am, I raise up my glance to you to admire you (more…)

Day #10: The Grace of God

MARY: The mercy of God never abandons you, (more…)

Day #9: My Soul

THE SOUL: I must not only know God in order to love him, I must also know myself. The careful examination of my misery (more…)

Day #8: Jesus

MARY: I present Jesus to you this morning; he is my Son and (more…)

Day #7: God

MARY: If you must have trust in God and hide yourself in him alone, it’s necessary to meditate on him. (more…)

Day #6: Trust

MARY: You must hide yourself in God; but precisely in order to do this, you must trust in him alone. (more…)

Day #5: Hiddenness

MARY: Do you know what is the real cause of the life and the beauty of a flower? … You see its brilliant shades, smell its delicate fragrance and yet you don’t recognize that all of this buds forth from those humble roots which are hidden in the barren and often muddy earth. It is the humble earth that secures the vital part of a flower and in it that the roots are hidden and these cannot give life to the flower if they are not hidden! Virtue is always born from an intimate and profound hiddenness! Flowers must certainly be seen for Jesus says: “Let your good deeds be seen by others”, but the seeds from which they bud, the life of the heart must remain concealed and hidden.

How many times do you not love to appear virtuous before those who see you and seek the vain praise of others’ Then you remove the root from being hidden, it unhappily dries up and also the flower wilts and dies. The paid gardener cuts the flower and ties it to an artificial stem so that it may be admired … but in doing this he kills it! When you seek human praise, you cut the flower of virtue and you place it on an artificial stem … After empty praise it is nothing more than a mass of withered leaves. Therefore love hiddenness and desire that only God sees you and reads the secret of your heart.

THE SOUL: O Mary, open your humble Heart to me as a refuge so that I may hide myself in it! Human
praise disturbs me, agitates me, makes me so ugly and I recognize that I get worse after praise. I?m full of pride and I can?t free myself of it except by hiding myself in God! O Mary, give me the strength to flee human praise and my vanity!

ASPIRATION: O Mary, give me humility of heart.

LITTLE WORK: When something redounds to your praise, don?t say it for the love of holy humility.

About the Meditations

The daily School of Mary meditations come from the book, A Month with Mary. To obtain a copy of this or other books published by the Academy of the Immaculate, visit our on-line bookstore at http://www.marymediatrix.com/bookstore/academy

Ave Maria!

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Day #4: Imagination

MARY: Why do so many hearts that desire perfection rarely attain their objective? How many persons close themselves in silence, abandon the world, seek to free themselves from all that binds the impulses of their heart … and yet they?re always the same!

Look at a shrub covered with ivy. How beautiful it seems! The woody part is completely hidden, its leaves seem to be like a head of hair on a green trunk. … That plant doesn?t bear fruit, however; it doesn?t grow; it always remains sterile … why?

The leaves which adorn its trunk are only a parasite. The ivy beautifies the shrub externally, but it also sucks its vital forces and impedes its life. It is necessary that the trunk appears as what it is, namely a trunk, and that the leaves not be the sterile appearance of a plant, but that they be full of flowers and fruit.

How many times you also would like to appear beautiful to your own glance … Your imagination deceives you and you cover your trunk with parasites which seemingly adorn you, but in fact take away your life.

A forced and oppressive silence is nothing other than ivy … You are externally silent, but speak all the more internally with your imagination, with outbursts of temper, with so many castles in the air … Get rid of this ivy! If you must converse, do it with great simplicity and preserve your heart recollected in God. Don?t dream of doing harsh penances when your heart isn?t yet penitent. Don?t be negligent and sloppy about your clothing, but be modest and simple. Don?t disguise your egotism with the tinsel of piety, but be charitable and good to all.

I want from you a gentle, sincere, profound, simple virtue, without ostentation, without vanity, without exaggeration … So many times you dream of martyrdom when you are not capable of benefiting from the daily contrariness which you find in your family!

THE SOUL: O my good Mother, how many miseries do you not make me discover in my heart? It?s true, I?m so fanciful that I believe myself to be immediately a saint, when I?m so poor in virtues … Give me a little humility so that the parasites don?t attach themselves to the humble and hidden little plants, but to the high trunks … Make my poor heart simple so that I may live only for God.

ASPIRATION: O Mary, free my heart from false virtue. O Jesus, forgive the sins that I don?t see in myself!

LITTLE WORK: If you want to do an act of virtue and realize that it would make you pleasant in the eyes of others, put off doing it to another time, if possible, when no one will see you and praise you.

About the Meditations

The daily School of Mary meditations come from the book, A Month with Mary. To obtain a copy of this or other books published by the Academy of the Immaculate, visit our on-line bookstore at http://www.marymediatrix.com/bookstore/academy

Ave Maria!

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Day #3: My Temperament

THE SOUL: In order to reform my heart I must study it intimately as it is, my good Mother. I look at it and I seem to see there a mass of confusion which doesn?t allow me to see it clearly. How full I am of darkness! You tell me what my temperament is, that is the fundamental character of my heart.

MARY: The temperament is the sum of the constant tendencies of the heart which propel it to act in the same way. You know your temperament from the defects into which you most often fall, from the spontaneous acts of your heart, from your habits …

Are you very easily given to anger, … do you get disturbed over nothing, do you react, show yourself offended? … Are you closed, taciturn, leaden; do you build so many castles in the air? … Are you insensitive, hard, egotistical, obstinate in your judgments? … Are you lazy, indolent, slow, negligent, pessimistic? … Do you see everything black and think that everyone is against you? Do you give too much weight to a word that innocently escapes from another and construe it to be an insinuation, an injury, a resentment? Do you easily hold a grudge, show resentment in small ways, react violently, backbite, grumble and even lie and calumniate? … Are you proud, full of yourself, vain, desirous of being admired, praised, given special consideration? … Are you greedy, attached to earthly things? Are you always looking for entertainment, ruminating about worldly ideals, hankering after your satisfactions, seeking after your tastes, complaining about your food, drink and clothing? … Examine yourself and where you perceive major lacks there you will discover your temperament and there is the field where you must exert more effort. It isn?t difficult to amend your ways; start a little at a time; begin to conquer yourself at least a few times every day
and you will see that your temperament will be modified and your heart will be changed.

ASPIRATION: O Mary, deliver me from the wretchedness of my character … from anger, from impatience …

LITTLE WORK: If it seems that a person who has offended you deserves to be reproved, don?t do it when you are still in a fit of anger, but wait until tomorrow to correct him.

About the Meditations

The daily School of Mary meditations come from the book, A Month with Mary. To obtain a copy of this or other books published by the Academy of the Immaculate, visit our on-line bookstore at http://www.marymediatrix.com/bookstore/academy

Ave Maria!

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Ave Maria! Here is the second one for today. From this point forward their will be on each day for the month of May.

Day #2: My Heart and the Heart of Mary

MARY: My little daughter, your mother is calling you and showing you what distinguishes her as Mother: the Heart! Draw near to my Heart, kiss it, and experience how burning is its love for you! God has submerged his mercies in it and wants it to be the center of regeneration for those children whom he has entrusted to me. You are my daughter and so entrust yourself to the Heart of your Mother who loves you so much.

THE SOUL: If you show me your Heart, Mary, I will also show you mine! How much smallness there is in my little heart! You are immaculate and pure, the delight of God and I am full of imperfections and faults! You love God immensely and I am so cold toward Him! You are so full of gifts and graces and I am your little poor one! … O my Mother, I place my heart in yours; work on it; lift it up into the holy love of God … reform it! It?s so ugly … even if I don?t really know it yet because I?m so blinded by pride … Tear the secrets from this heart; curtail its self-deceptions with your light; adorn it with virtues by the help of your grace so that I can truly call myself your child.

MARY: If you want to know your heart, measure it against mine. Don?t believe that all is evil within you nor
that all is good. Don?t be discouraged or presumptuous, but recognize your weaknesses with filial simplicity without hiding them from your sight and without getting irritated … Always remain in peace and I will help you to reform yourself.

ASPIRATION: O Heart of Mary, be my model and the refuge of my poor heart.

LITTLE WORK: Deprive yourself of something superfluous to which you feel attached.

About the Meditations

The daily School of Mary meditations come from the book, A Month with Mary, written by a holy Italian priest Father Dolindo Ruotolo (1882-1970). Originally written as spiritual thoughts to his spiritual daughter, the work is comprised of thirty-one meditations for the month of May.

Father Dolindo wrote A Month with Mary on pocket-sized pages joined into small fascicles of 8 to 12 pages. He sent them to Laura de Rosis every two to three days and later transcribed them with some modifications in volume III of his autobiography: The Story of My Life in the Plan of the Great Mercy of God, pp. 1140ff (cf. Epistolario 1:212n, 218n). This work is from 1912: one of those years which passed in the life of Father Dolindo with the cadence of a “Way of the Cross” … But he, serene as ever, loved Christ the more, loved Our Lady the more and reflected on this love in these few pages to which he wished to give the significant title: A Profound Reform of Heart in the School of Mary. These meditations are written in the style of the Imitation of Christ. (90pp. laminated gloss, saddle stitch)

To obtain a copy of A Month with Mary or other books published by the Academy of the Immaculate, visit our on-line bookstore at http://www.marymediatrix.com/bookstore/academy

Ave Maria!

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