The Spirit and the Bride

I, Jesus, have sent my angel, to testify to you these things in the churches. I am the root and stock of David, the bright and morning star. And the spirit and the bride say: Come. And he that heareth, let him say: Come. And he that thirsteth, let him come. And he that will, let him take the water of life, freely. . . . Come, Lord Jesus (Rev. 21:16-17, 20).

A postconciliar Mariology that is both traditional and one that addresses the present crisis of modernity is one that sees Mary in relation to both Christ and the Church.  In the context of Pentecost, this means that She is both Spouse of the Holy Spirit and Teacher of the Apostles.

Pope Benedict has said that the Marian principle of the Church is even more fundamental than the Petrine, because the Church is not an idea, but a person, and at Pentecost (as on Calvary) Mary is Mother of the Church from the top down.  If this is true at every moment of Christian history, it is particularly true in this age of Marian prophecy (Rue de Bac, Lourdes, Fatima, Bl. John Paul II).

The Immaculate-Meditatrix directs human acts and serves as the living model of pastoral prudence and prophetic inspiration, reform and innovation in continuity.  This is an integrated and holistic approach to Mariology, and one that is vitally necessary in order to address the disintegration of modernity.  It is Spirit-filled: faithful to the deposit of the faith and responsive the souls that need to be saved in real-time.

Most of all in and through Her and Her Spouse, we must continue in hope for a New Pentecost that looks forward toward the East, not one that faces the western darkness of hopelessness or presumption.

But Our Lady respects our will.  Consecration to Mary is an act of the will.  It is consent in the Marian “yes” of salvation history.  That is all that stands between us and our destiny of light or darkness: one little yes.

The Spirit and the Bride say “come”.

1 thought on “The Spirit and the Bride

  1. iconography Ladder equates with understanding assumption into Heaven before dogma explicit? Model, as in ‘mediatrix’ of human perfection? Here the entry on Marian veneration under her Spanish “ladder” title Nuestra Senora de la Escalera

    and symbolic use in representations of various sanct e beati

    and the eastern style of depicting a deprated’s soul as a wee infant self going to meet his maker, e.g. Acts 7, Stephen’s famous last words “You received the law as transmitted by angels, but you did not observe it.” v53 “Lord Jesus, receive my spirit.”* v59 in imitation of Christs last words,“Lord, do not hold this sin against them”; (v60) as here in Arles’ St-Trophime Cathedral (founded 8thC ie Byzantine uniformity stil evident in church art).

    I can’t help thinking Ascent of Mt Carmel (spirituality of St John of Cross) and pious legends associated with Simon Stock’s receipt scapular and Dominic’s of the Rosary aren’t “novelties” rather a renewed appreciation of Marian intercession, an eikon archeopoeita of ‘lost’ Byzantine traditions (mozarabic rite suppressed in former Greco-Roman territories of Spain and Sicily, continued on in Crete)?

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