Tea at Trianon: A Letter from St. Maximilian

John Wilson Croker on Marie-Antoinette

"We have followed the history of Marie Antoinette with the greatest diligence and scrupulosity. We have lived in those times. We have talked with some of her friends and some of her enemies; we have read, certainly not all, but hundreds of the libels written against her; and we have, in short, examined her life with– if we may be allowed to say so of ourselves– something of the accuracy of contemporaries, the diligence of inquirers, and the impartiality of historians, all combined; and we feel it our duty to declare, in as a solemn a manner as literature admits of, our well-matured opinion that every reproach against the morals of the queen was a gross calumny– that she was, as we have said, one of the purest of human beings."

~from History of the Guillotine by John Wilson Croker, 1844

Edmund Burke on Marie-Antoinette

"It is now sixteen or seventeen years since I saw the queen of France, then dauphiness, at Versailles; and surely there never lighted on this orb, which she hardly seemed to touch, a more delightful vision. I saw her just above the horizon, decorating and cheering the elevated sphere she had just begun to move in, glittering like a morning star full of life and splendor and joy. Oh, what a revolution....Little did I dream that I should have lived to see such disasters fall upon her, in a nation of gallant men, in a nation of men of honor and of cavaliers! I thought ten thousand swords must have leaped from their scabbards, to avenge even a look which threatened her with insult. But the age of chivalry is gone; that of sophisters, economists, and calculators has succeeded...."

~Edmund Burke, October 1790

Wednesday, May 3, 2017

A Letter from St. Maximilian

From Vultus Christi:

There are two moments in every sacrificium or consecration. The first moment corresponds to the Offertory of the Mass. One hands oneself over, offering to God one’s body and soul, one’s past, present, and future. Here the action is human; it engages one’s free will and, normally, finds expression in the formulation of an “act of consecration.”

From the human perspective, this is the active mode of consecration. One must hold fast, nonethless, to the truth that every good action is a free response, made possible by grace, to a divine solicitation of the heart. One consecrates oneself at the prompting of the Holy Spirit, and in the grace of obedience to that inner prompting. I consecrate myself.

The second moment corresponds to the consecration of the Mass. One is acted upon by the Holy Spirit sent by the Father at the invocation of the Son. Here the action is divine, not human. The agent is God Himself, the work of sanctification/consecration being fittingly attributed to the Holy Spirit. I am consecrated.

Why would one risk an act of consecration, knowing full well that it will bring upon the one making it a configuration to Christ Jesus in the mystery of His sacrifice? One dares to consecrate oneself because it is the only response worthy of the love of God.

He who did not spare his own Son but gave him up for us all, will he not also give us all things with him? (Rom 8:32)
To be consecrated to the Sacred Heart of Jesus, and to be abandoned or given over to His love are, in effect the same thing. By consecrating oneself to the Sacred Heart of Jesus is to hand oneself over to His merciful love. This action on our part allows Our Lord to act upon us freely in view of the glory of His Father, the fruitfulness of His Church, and our own sanctification. Our Lord seeks souls who will hand themselves over to His love, just as He handed himself over to His Father’s love upon the altar of the Cross.

This is where Marian consecration comes in. The most effective way of handing oneself over to Jesus is through Mary. The consecration of oneself, made in her virginal hands, is immediately “handed over” to Jesus, the Eternal High Priest, who, in turn, unites it to His own perfect oblation to the Father. (Read more.)