Chapter 25. The Presentation of the Baptist in the Temple. St. Joseph's Passion.
5th and 6th April 1944.
This is what I see the night between
the Wednesday and Thursday of the Holy Week.
I see Zacharias, Elizabeth, Mary and
Samuel getting off a comfortable waggon, to which also Mary's little
donkey is tied. Mary is holding little John in Her arms and Samuel
has a lamb and a basket with a pigeon in it. They get off at the
usual stable, which must be the halting place for all the pilgrims to
the Temple, who leave their mounts there.
Mary calls to the owner and asks him
whether anybody arrived from Nazareth the day before or early that
morning. « Nobody, woman » replies the little old man. Mary is
surprised, but does not say anything else.
She gets Samuel to fix her little
donkey, and then She joins the two elderly parents, and She explains
Joseph's delay: « He must have been held up by something. But he
will certainly come today. » She takes the child again from
Elizabeth to whom She had handed him before, and they all set out for
the Temple.
Zacharias is received with honour by
the guards, and is greeted and congratulated by other priests. He is
very handsome today, in his priestly robes and his joy of happy
fatherhood. He looks like a patriarch. I think that Abraham must have
been like him when he rejoiced offering Isaac to the Lord.
I see the ceremony of the presentation
of the new Israelite and the purification of his mother. The ceremony
is more stately than Mary's, because the priests celebrate it
solemnly for the son of another priest. They all rush round the group
of women and the child, and are happily engaged with them.
Also some curious people have come near
and I can hear their comments. Since Mary is holding the child in Her
arms while they move to the appointed place, the people think She is
the mother.
But a woman says: « It's not possible.
Can't you see that She is pregnant? The baby is only a few days old
and she is already with child. »
« And yet » points out another one «
only She can be the mother. The other woman is old. She must be a
relative. But she certainly cannot be the mother at her age. »
« Let us follow them, and we will see
who is right. »
And their surprise becomes even greater
when they see that it is Elizabeth who fulfills the purification
rite: she offers the bleating lamb in holocaust and the pigeon for
sin.
« She is the mother. Didn't I tell
you? »
« No! »
« Yes. »
The people whisper, still incredulous.
They whisper so much that a peremptory « Ssst! » comes from the
group of priests present at the rite. They are silent for a moment,
but start whispering even louder when Elizabeth, radiant with holy
pride, takes the child and moves forward in the Temple to make the
presentation to the Lord.
« It is she! »
« It's always the mother who makes the
offering. »
« What miracle can this be? »
« What will that child be, who has
been granted to that woman at such an old age? »
« What sign can it be? »
« Don't you know? » says one, who has
just arrived panting. « It's the son of Zacharias, the priest of the
house of Aaron, the one who became dumb when he was offering incense
in the Sanctuary. »
« It's a mystery! A mystery! And now
he speaks once again! The birth of his son has untied his tongue. »
« I wonder what spirit spoke to him
and paralysed his tongue to accustom him to be silent about the
secrets of God! »
« It is a mystery! What secret truth
does Zacharias know? »
« Will his son be the Messiah expected
by Israel? »
« He was born in Judaea. Not in
Bethlehem and not of a virgin. He can't be the Messiah! »
« Who is he, then? »
But the answer remains in the silence
of God and the people are left to their curiosity.
The ceremony is over. The priests are
now joyfully paying compliments to the mother and her child. The only
one who is hardly noticed, nay, is avoided almost with disgust when
they become aware of Her condition, is Mary.
After all the congratulations, most of
them go out on to the road. Mary wants to go to the stable to see
whether Joseph has arrived. He has not. Mary is disappointed and
worried.
Elizabeth is anxious about Her. « We
can stay until midday, then we must go, to be home before night. He
is too young to be out at night. »
And Mary, calm and sad: « I will stay
in one of the yards of the Temple. I will go to My teachers… I do
not know. I will do something »
Zacharias puts forward a proposal which
is immediately accepted as a good solution: « Let us go to Zebedee's
relatives. Joseph will certainly look for You there. If he should not
come there, it will be quite easy for You to find someone who will
accompany You to Galilee, because the fishermen from Gennesaret are
continuously going to and coming from that house. »
They take the little donkey, and go to
Zebedee's relatives, who are the very same people with whom Joseph
and Mary stayed four months before.
The time passes quickly, but there is
no sign of Joseph. Mary controls Her grief lulling the baby, but it
is obvious that She is worried. Although it is so warm that everybody
is perspiring, She has not taken off Her mantle, concerned as She is
to conceal Her condition.
At long last, Joseph is announced by a
loud knocking at the door. Mary's face shines, cheerful again.
Joseph greets Her, because She is the
first to go and meet him and greet him reverently. « The Lord's
blessing on you, Mary! »
« And on you, Joseph. And praised be
the Lord that you have come! Here, Zacharias and Elizabeth were about
to leave, to be at home before night. »
« Your messenger arrived in Nazareth,
when I was at Cana, working there. I was told the other evening. And
I left at once. But although I have travelled without stopping, I am
late, because the donkey lost one of his shoes. Please forgive me. »
« I am to be forgiven by you, because
I have been away from Nazareth for such a long time! But see, they
were so happy to have Me with them, that I decided to please them up
till now. »
« You have done well, Woman. Where is
the baby? »
They enter the room where Elizabeth is
giving suck to little John, before departing. Joseph congratulates
the parents on the sturdiness of the child, who screams and kicks, as
if they were thrashing him, because he has been taken away from his
mother's breast to be shown to Joseph. They all laugh at his
protests. Also Zebedee's relatives, who have come in with fresh
fruit, milk and bread for everybody, and a large tray of fish, laugh
and join in the conversation.
Mary speaks very little. She is sitting
quiet and silent in Her little comer, with Her hands on Her lap under
Her mantle. Also when She drinks a cup of milk, and eats a bunch of
golden grapes with a little bread, She speaks very little, and hardly
moves. Her looks at Joseph are a mixture of pain and enquiry.
He also looks at Her. And after some
time, bending over Her shoulder, he asks Her: « Are You tired or are
You not well? You look pale and sad. »
« I am sorry I have to part from
little John. I am very fond of him. I held him on My heart only a few
minutes after he was born… »
Joseph does not ask any more questions.
It is time for Zacharias to depart. The
waggon stops at the door and they all go towards it. The two cousins
embrace each other fondly. Mary kisses the baby many times before
putting him in the lap of his mother, who is already sitting in the
waggon. She then says goodbye to Zacharias, and asks him to bless
Her. When kneeling before the priest, Her mantle slips off Her
shoulders, and Her figure appears in the bright light of the summer
afternoon. I do not know whether Joseph notices Her figure at this
moment, because he is intent on saying goodbye to Elizabeth. The
waggon leaves.
Joseph goes back into the house with
Mary, Who sits down again in the dim comer. « If You do not mind
travelling by night, I would suggest we leave at sunset. It is very
warm during the day. The night instead is cool and quiet. I am saying
that for You, because I don't want You to get sunstroke. It makes no
difference to me to be in a scorching sun. But You… »
« As you wish, Joseph. I also think it
is better to travel by night. »
« The house has been all tidied up.
And the little orchard. The flowers are beautiful, as You will see.
You are arriving just in time to see them all in bloom. The
apple-tree, the fig-tree, the vines are laden with fruit as was never
seen before, and I had to put a support for the pomegranate, because
its branches were so heavily laden with fruit already fully grown, a
thing which has never been seen before at this time of the year. The
olive-tree… You will have plenty oil. It blossomed in a miraculous
way, and not one flower was lost. All the flowers are now little
olives. When they are mature, the tree will seem full of dark pearls.
There isn't another orchard as beautiful in the whole of Nazareth.
Also Your relatives are surprised. Alphaeus says it is a miracle. »
« Your hands have worked it! »
« Oh! no! Poor me! What can I have
done? I took care of the trees and I gave some water to the flowers…
Do You know? I built a fountain for You down at the end, near the
grotto, and I put a large basin there. So You will not have to go out
to get water. I brought the water down from the spring which is above
Matthew's olivegrove. It is pure and plentiful. I brought a little
stream down to You. I dug a small duct in the ground, I covered it
properly, and now the water comes down, singing like a harp. I was
not happy that You should go to the village fountain, and then carry
back home the jars full of water. »
« Thank you, Joseph. You are so good!
»
-------------
Joseph and Mary are now silent, as if
they were tired. And Joseph is also dozing. Mary is praying.
It is now evening. The host insists
that they should eat something before leaving. Joseph, in fact, eats
some bread and fish, while Mary takes only some milk and fruit.
They then depart. They get on their
donkeys. Joseph has fastened Mary's little trunk to his saddle, as he
had done when coming to Jerusalem. And before She gets on Her donkey,
he makes sure that Her saddle is properly fastened. I see that Joseph
looks at Mary when she mounts Her saddle. But he does not say
anything. Their journey starts when the first stars begin to twinkle
in the sky.
They hurry to the town gates to reach
them before they close. When they come out of Jerusalem, and they
take the main road towards Galilee, the clear sky is already crowded
with stars. There is solemn quietness in the country. One can hear
only a few nightingales singing, and the beating of the hooves of the
two donkeys on the hard road, baked by the sun.
---------------
Mary says:
Mary says:
« It is the eve of Maundy Thursday.
Some people may think that this vision is out of place. But your
grief of lover of My Jesus Crucified is in your heart and will remain
there even if a sweet vision is shown to you. It is like the tepidity
emanating from a flame, which is still fire but is no longer fire.
The flame is fire, not its tepidity which comes from it. No beatific
or peaceful vision will be able to remove that grief from your heart.
And regard it as something precious, more precious than your own
life. Because it is the greatest gift that God can grant a believer
in His Son. Further, my vision is not discordant, in all its peace,
with the commemorations of this week.
Also My Joseph suffered his passion. It
began in Jerusalem when he noticed My condition. And it lasted
several days, exactly as it had happened to Jesus and to Me. Neither
was it less painful for his soul. And only because of the holiness of
My just spouse, it was contained in such a dignified and secret form,
that it has been hardly noticed throughout centuries.
Oh! Our first Passion! Who can feel its
intimate and silent intensity? Who can describe My pain when I
realised that Heaven had not yet heard My prayer by revealing the
mystery to Joseph?
I understood that he was not aware of
it when I saw that he was respectful to Me as usual. If he had known
that I bore in Me the Word of God, he would have adored that Word
enclosed in My womb, with the acts of veneration which are due to God
and which he would not have failed to accomplish, as I would not have
refused to receive, not for My own sake, but for Him Who was within
Me and that I bore, as the Ark of the Alliance carried the stone code
and the vases of manna.
Who can measure My struggle against the
dismay that endeavoured to overwhelm Me in order to convince Me
that I had hoped in vain in the Lord? Oh! I think it was the furious
rage of Satan! I perceived doubt rising behind My back, and
stretching its icy claws to imprison My soul and prevent it from
praying. Doubt is so dangerous and lethal to the spirit. It is lethal
because it is the first agent of the deadly disease called “despair”,
against which we must react with all our strength, so that our souls
may not perish, and we may not lose God.
Who can truly tell Joseph's pain, his
thoughts, the perturbation of his feelings? Like a little boat caught
in a great storm, he was in a vortex of conflicting ideas, in a
turmoil of reflections, of which one was more piercing and painful
than the other. He was, to all appearances, a man betrayed by his
wife. He saw his good reputation and the esteem of his world collapse
around him; because of Her he saw scornful fingers pointed at himself
and felt pitied by the village people. Above all, he perceived that
his love and esteem for Me had fallen, struck to death, before the
evidence of a deed.
In this respect, his holiness shines
brighter than Mine. And I give this witness with the affection of a
spouse, because I want you to love My Joseph, this wise, prudent,
patient and good man, who is not separated from the mystery of
Redemption, on the contrary, he is closely connected to it, because
he suffered for it, consuming himself in sorrow for it, saving your
Saviour at the cost of his own sacrifice because of his holiness.
Had he not been so holy, he would have
acted in a human way, denouncing Me as an adulteress so that I should
be stoned, and the Son of My sin should perish with Me. If he had
been less holy, God would not have granted him His light as guidance
in his trial. But Joseph was holy. His pure spirit lived in God. His
charity was ardent and strong. And out of charity he saved your
Saviour for you, both when he refrained from accusing Me to the
elders, and when he saved Jesus in Egypt, leaving everything with
prompt obedience.
The three days of Joseph's passion were
short in number, but deep in intensity. And they were tremendous also
for Me, those days of My first passion. Because I was aware of his
suffering, which I could not alleviate, in fact I had to obey God's
command Who had said to Me: “Be silent!”
And when, after we arrived in Nazareth,
I saw him go away with a laconic goodbye, and bent as if he had aged
in a short time, and I noticed that he no longer came to see Me in
the evening as he used to do, then I tell you, My children, that My
heart wept very bitterly. Closed in My house, all alone, in the house
where everything reminded Me of the Annunciation and the Incarnation,
and where everything reminded Me of Joseph, married to Me with
spotless virginity, I had to fight despair and Satan's insinuation,
and hope, hope, hope. And pray, pray, pray. And forgive, forgive,
forgive Joseph's suspicion, his disturbance and just despair.
My
children: it is necessary to hope, to pray, to forgive to obtain
God's intervention in our favour. You must live your passions,
because you deserved them with your sins. I can teach you how to
overcome them and turn them into joy. Hope beyond measure. Pray with
confidence. Forgive to be forgiven. God's forgiveness will be the
peace you desire, My children.
I will not say anything else for the
time being. There will be silence until after the Easter triumph. It
is Passion time. Have pity on your Redeemer. Listen to His cries, and
count His wounds and tears. The former were suffered, the latter shed
for you. Let every other vision disappear before that one which
reminds you of the Redemption accomplished on your behalf. »
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