Tea at Trianon: Merciful Love through Mary

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

Saturday, August 15, 2026

Merciful Love through Mary

From Vultus Christi:

Those familiar with the devotion of total consecration to Jesus through Mary will be familiar with all these ideas. Saint Louis de Montfort says that, through Mary, every little work becomes acceptable, and even its imperfections are entirely cleansed. He recommends Mary as merciful. He states that those who take other ways have more (not less) “obscure nights, combats, strange agonies, craggy mountains, cruel thorns, and frightful deserts.” But he affirms that “by the path of Mary, we pass more gently and more tranquilly.” And because the offering of ourselves is so little, he states that we do well to offer ourselves through Mary so that Mary will offer herself with us.

Perhaps the most remarkable similarity, though, is the way that both the Oblation to Merciful Love and Total Consecration to Mary involve the handing over of everything: all we are, have, and possess, such that we die and show up at the judgment seat with empty hands, without a single good work or spiritual treasure. And yet in the case of both, this engenders confidence. We are freed to do everything and give everything — no matter how small or imperfect — for love alone with confidence that, if we truly keep nothing for ourselves, neither farthing or penny, we will be clothed with riches that are not our own, the riches of Jesus Christ and His Holy Mother. With such similarities, the question naturally arises about the compatibility of the two. Is it merely the case that some are attracted to offering themselves to Merciful Love and others to Mary, or is there, perhaps, a way in which the two fit together into a single whole? This is the question we hope to explore over the coming days.

But first, let us take a closer look at true devotion and total consecration to Mary. (Read more.)