Ave Maria Meditations
(To) Mary: I cannot even imagine the joy that filled your heart as you gazed at your Child with wondering awe, lifted Him from the manger, cradled Him in your arms and pressed Him to your heart. The love that welled up in His little Heart was divine love, and you must have received it with the utmost humility, never for a moment deeming yourself worthy of it, but returning to favor with all the love of your own Immaculate Heart.
Such love set your heart on fire with love of your infant Son; not merely as your son, but as your God and Savior, since you have already shared in the merits of His passion and death. You loved Him according to the measure of the grace with which you were full. I have but a very faint notion of the delight that overflowed your soul as a result of such love.
Your soul was stirred with sentiments of admiration for the wondrous Providence of God when you saw the first adorers of your divine Child who had been led to the crib by the message of an angel. You fully appreciated the meaning of your poverty and kept all these things, pondering them in your heart. Help me to learn the lesson of humility, poverty, and self-denial, which Jesus preached from His first pulpit, the little crib.
From the Complete Marian Prayerbook
