Roberto de Mattei
Corrispondenza Romana
April, 8, 2020
Easter
Week 2020 is destined to go down in history - for its exceptional nature - like
that day in February 2013, when Benedict XVI announced his renunciation of the
Papacy. A mysterious thread seems to link these two events. The same sense of
emptiness connects them.
Benedict XVI juridically renounced the Petrine
Mandate, without explaining the legitimate moral motives that might shed light
on his extreme act. Pope Francis, for his part, juridically conserves this
mandate, but doesn’t exercise it and even seems to want to strip himself of the
highest title he holds, that as Vicar of Christ, transcribed, in the latest edition
of the Pontifical Yearbook, as a historical title, and not constitutive. If
Benedict XVI renounced the juridical exercise of the Vicariate of Christ, it
almost seems that Pope Francis has renounced the moral exercise of his mission.
The suspension of religious ceremonies all over the world, afflicted by the
Coronavirus, seems to be a symbolic, but real, expression of an unprecedented
situation, in which Divine Providence has taken away from the Pastors – the very people they abandoned.
We do not
know what the political, economical and social consequences will be of the
Corona- virus, but we can measure its consequences on the Church these days. A
veil seems to have been lifted: it is the hour of emptiness; of the flock
deprived of their Pastors. St.Peter’s Square, empty on Palm Sunday, will also
be empty on Easter Sunday. “The Holy Father – the Vatican communicated – will
celebrate the Rites of Holy Week, without a congregation, as a result of the
extraordinary situation we are in, caused by the diffusion of the Covid-19
pandemic".
According
to the philosophia perennis, nature abhors a vacuum (natura
abhorret a vacuo). In the hour of spiritual emptiness, the souls of
those who have faith, turn instinctively to the One, Who is never empty, since
She is filled with all the graces: the Most Blessed Virgin Mary. Only in Her, can
the soul find the spiritual and moral fullness, that St. Peter’s Square and the
countless closed churches now no longer offer. But Pope Francis, instead of
fostering devotion to Mary, wants also to strip Her of the titles due to Her.
On December 12, 2019, the Pope liquidated the possibility of new Marian dogmas
( like that of Maria Co-Redemptrix) stating: “when stories come whereby this or
that should be declared, or this dogma be done, let’s not get caught up in
foolishness.” And on April 3, 2020, he reiterated that Our Lady “didn’t ask to
be a quasi –redemptrix, or co-redemptrix. No. There is only one Redeemer. [She is] only
a disciple and mother.”
These words were expressed on
the eve of Holy Week, the time Our Lady fulfills Her mission on Calvary as
Co-Redemptrix and Mediatrix of all graces. Pope Benedict XV, explains it in
this way: “As She suffers and almost dies with Her suffering and dying Son, so
she renounced Her rights as Mother of this Son, for the salvation of men,
immolating Him to placate the Divine justice, so that it can be said, rightly,
that She redeemed mankind along with Christ. Manifestly, for this reason, all
the different graces from the treasures of the Redemption are also distributed
through the hands of Our Lady of Sorrows” (Apostolic Letter Inter sodalicia,
March 22, 1918).
According
to some theologians, the word Co-Redemptrix absorbs that of Mediatrix;
according to others, like Father Manfred Hauke, the words universal-mediation
of Mary lend a wider meaning to that of co-redemption, containing that [idea]in
them (Introduzione alla Mariologia,
Eupress FTL, Lugano 2008, pp. 275-277). She integrates the “descending “
aspect, whereby graces reach men, with that “ascending” aspect expressed in the
co-redemption, through which Our Lady is united to the Sacrifice of Christ. The
two titles, in any case, are complementary, as Monsignor Brunero Gherardini
teaches in his paper La corredentrice nel
mistero di Cristo e della Chiesa (Viverein, Roma 1998), and are linked to
that of Queen of Heaven and Earth.
Need we
say more? St. Bernard says: “De Maria
numquam satis» (Sermo de Nativitate
Mariae, Patrologia Latina, vol. 183, col. 437D and St. Alphonsus Maria Liguori
states: “When an opinion is in any way
honorable to the Most Holy Virgin, and has some foundation, and is not
repugnant to the faith and the decrees of the Church, and to the truth, the
rejection of it, and opposition to it, because the contrary may also be true,
indicates little devotion to the Mother of God. I would not be one of the
number of these, nor would I see you, my reader, one of them, but rather of the
number of those who fully and firmly believe all that can be believed, without
error, concerning the greatness of Mary” (The
Glories of Mary, Chapter V, § 1).
Those devoted to Mary are a spiritual family which has its prototype and
patron in St. John, the Evangelist, the beloved apostle, who, on Calvary, received
an immense legacy from Jesus. Everything is summed up in the words of Jesus,
when, from the Cross, “[He saw] his mother and
the disciple standing whom He loved, He saith to His mother: Woman, behold thy
son. After that, He saith to the disciple: Behold thy mother”((John,
19, 26-27). With these words Jesus established a divine and
indissoluble bond, not only between Our Blessed Mother and St. John – the representative
of mankind - but between Her and all the
souls following the example of St. John’s faith and fidelity. St. John is the
model of those, who, in the hour of betrayal and renunciation, remain faithful
to Jesus, through Mary. “God-Holy Spirit, wants to form the elect in Her, and
through Her and says to Her: ‘in electis
meis mitte radices’ (Siracide 24,
12)”, writes St. Louis de Monfort (Treatise on the True Devotion to the
Holy Virgin, n.34), assuring us that Her devotees will receive firm and unshakeable
faith rendering them steadfast and constant amidst all the storms (ivi, n. 214).
Plinio Corrêa de Oliveira demonstrated how Marian
devotion, not exterior and inconstant, but firm and perseverant, is the
decisive factor, in the battle between the Revolution and the
Counter-Revolution which will intensify increasingly in the dark times awaiting
us. Mary, the Universal Mediatrix, is in fact the channel though which all
graces pass and graces will rain down in abundance upon those who pray to Her
and fight for Her. (Rivoluzione e
Contro-Rivoluzione, ed. it. Sugarco, Milano 2009, pp. 319-332).
The great
Arch-Deacon of Évreux, Henri-Marie Boudon, whose
spirituality formed St. Louis Maria Grignion de Montfort, wrote that
in public calamities, such as wars and epidemics, we blame others, while we
should blame ourselves and our sins: “Gods strike us in order that He be be
contemplated and we, instead, do not raise our eyes from creatures” (La dévotion aux saints anges, Clovis,
Condé-su-Noireau 1998, p. 265).
In these
unsettling days, let’s not tire ourselves by searching for the human hand
behind the pandemic. Let us be glad in perceiving the hand of God. And since
Our Lady, besides being Co-Redemptrix and Mediatrix, is also Queen of the Universe,
let us not forget that God assigned Her the mission of intervening in history, to
oppose the action the demon exercises on us. For this reason then, when the
Lord chastises mankind, our sole refuge is Mary. Those who don’t abandon their
post, draw strength from Her and stay on the field to fight the last battle:
the battle for the triumph of Her Immaculate Heart.
Translation:
Contributor Francesca Romana
