The Graces and Merits of Mary

Today’s Meditations on Christian Dogma is called “The Graces and Merits of Mary.” It was submitted by Sister Mary Claire and her little sister Kathy from Camp Littlemore Farm, and comes from their treasured old book, Meditations on Christian Dogma by Father James Bellord, first published in the 19th century. Sister Mary Claire received the book as a gift from an elderly nun friend in County Kilkenny, Ireland, and she treasures it dearly.

I. Exemption from original sin carries with it a great many other privileges, for that sin involves a great many consequences. It causes a deterioration in soul and body, intellect, will, and every other faculty; it introduces into us ignorance, concupiscence, malice, and a propensity to every kind of evil. Even when we recover grace, many of the effects of sin still remain. The holiest of men is not exempt from weaknesses; and the greatest labour of his life is the unceasing struggle against his own semi-dormant passions. He attains success only through countless failures; and, at the best, he is but a restored and buttressed ruin. During this life, peril is never absent, victory never secure.

The singular grace of God placed the Blessed Virgin on an altogether higher level. She was exempt from every one of the miseries and sad liabilities of sin from the very first. The last stage of the greatest saint’s life is far inferior to Mary’s first stage in grace. She began her ascent where the greatest saints left off; according to the prophet, “The mountain of the house of the Lord shall be prepared on the top of the mountains” (Isa. ii. 2). All these exceeding graces, Mary’s union with God, God’s love for her, were only in proportion to the high office to which she was called; they were all required in preparation for the unexampled dignity of the Divine Maternity.

The magnificence of God as exhibited in the universe which He has prepared for our habitation exceeds all our calculations, and all our wonderful powers of investigation, and expression, and imagination even. Much more magnificent is the bounty of God in the supernatural order, and especially in that one being who is superior to all the other works of His hand. It is not only due to the Blessed Virgin, it is due to God that you should pay homage to such an exhibition of His infinite power and holiness.

II. The graces of God need to be supplemented by our action. We have to accept them, make use of them, correspond to them in proportion to their greatness, and so make them efficient. This the Blessed Virgin did with the greatest fidelity and perfection beyond all other creatures. Her life is not to be considered as inactive and inglorious because so little is recorded of her. It was an interior life, and was most truly “hidden with Christ in God” (Col. iii. 3). The value of our service of God depends not so much on the opportunities of external action, but on the dispositions of our souls and their attachment to God.

The life-work of Our Lady was of necessity carried on in obscurity, but it was of a higher kind, and it contributed more to the advantage of mankind and the glory of God than all the labours of the Apostles. She was continually in the presence of God; she learned from Him during the intimate communications of the thirty years; she practised every virtue in a sublime degree; she suffered a life-long martyrdom; she advanced daily with giant steps in the path of holiness. Her fidelity was more, if possible, than her graces. As Our Lord said, she was more blessed in hearing His word and keeping it, than even in the privilege of being His Mother according to the flesh.

Learn hence to be faithful to your graces. Be sure that mediocre talents and obscure position do not preclude you from the greatest merit and reward.

III. Mary’s graces received, and fidelity rendered, are the measure of her supernatural glory, and of the position which she holds in heaven and in the Church. Of all men and all angels, none received such high favours from God, none was brought into such close relations with the Divinity, none was so faithful to grace, none loved God so intensely. In proportion to this she has received “good measure, and pressed down, and shaken together, and running over” (Luke vi. 38). So she holds the highest place in heaven, and is nearest of all to her Divine Son. So she is Queen of earth and heaven, Queen of angels and of men. So too is her power great to intercede for us. Your veneration for her, your confidence in her prayers, your imitation of her virtues, your praise of God on her account, ought to be in due proportion to her graces, merits and favor with God.