The Message of Fatima and the Year of Faith: I Am My Brother's Keeper

Our Lady of Fatima

We would be mistaken to think that Fatima’s prophetic mission is complete. Here there takes on new life the plan of God which asks humanity from the beginning: “Where is your brother Abel […] Your brother’s blood is crying out to me from the ground!” (Gen 4:9). Mankind has succeeded in unleashing a cycle of death and terror, but failed in bringing it to an end… In sacred Scripture we often find that God seeks righteous men and women in order to save the city of man and he does the same here, in Fatima, when Our Lady asks: “Do you want to offer yourselves to God, to endure all the sufferings which he will send you, in an act of reparation for the sins by which he is offended and of supplication for the conversion of sinners?”
Pope Benedict XVI  
May 13, 2010

Today is the 95th Anniversary of the Miracle of the Sun at Fatima, Portugal.  It was on October 13, 1917, when Mary, the Mother of God, appeared for the last time at Fatima, Portugal to three small shepherd children, Francisco, Jacinta and Lucia.  Our Lady first began to appear to the children in May of 1917, giving them messages that resonate to our day and, in fact, are more relevant to our time than when she first appeared at Fatima.  Many at that time began to believe in the apparitions, but there were still many skeptics.  Our Lady promised the children that there were would be a great miracle to prove that she was appearing to them.  True to her promise, the Sun "danced in the sky" on October 13, 1917 at noon time, the day and time she predicted, in front of 70,000 people who had gathered at the apparition site.  From Mystics of the Church:

On October 13th a crowd of 70,000 gathered at the Cova da Iria in response to the children’s claim that a miracle would occur on that day “so that all may believe.” At the appointed time, in the middle of a rainstorm the clouds broke up and the sun was seen as a disk spinning in the sky, throwing off great rays of fantastic colours. As one columnist reported, “Before the astonished eyes of the crowd the sun trembled and danced.” Suddenly it seemed to fall until it almost reached the earth, but then it stopped, slowly making its way back into the sky. Many of those present “wept and prayed” in recognition of the miracle they had awaited. The phenomenon was witnessed by people 40 kilometres away, proving that mass hysteria could not be held responsible.

Fatima, Portugal on October 13, 1917

Our Lady of Fatima said the following to the shepherd children at this final apparition:  "I am the Lady of the Rosary. Continue always to pray the Rosary every day."  She also warned us, "Do not offend the Lord our God any more, because He is already so much offended."  If our Lord was much offended in 1917 when much of the world still believed in God and at the very least recognized His laws and authority in their lives, how much more offended must our Lord be now when we condone homosexuality, promote same sex "marriage", legalize the killing of our unborn children and sick and elderly, promote artificial birth control and fill our entertainment with lewd and immoral images?  And that's just for starters on how evil and godless our world has become.

The World's Answer to God

The message of our Lady of Fatima was all about bringing people back to God through penance and reparations.  At one point Our Lady showed the children a vision of hell and said many poor sinners go there because they have no one to pray for them.  She told us that our prayers are not just for ourselves but for others as well.  Our Blessed Lady told us that we are our brother's keeper.  Part of the blame for the evil in the world must be laid at the feet of those of us who were given the great gift of faith at our baptism, but like the worthless servant spoken of by Christ, we buried this gift instead of using it to help others.  The result is the evil world we see around us.

Below is a clip from the movie, "The 13th Day" which explains the prophecies given by our Lady of Fatima and the consequences of rejecting our Lord:


Here in the United States, our own government feels free to tell the Catholic Church how to practice their religion. The government is forcing Catholics to promote the use of artificial contraception, and the Church rightly rejects this and fights against it. But at the same time most Catholics, in direct disobedience to the Church, use this same contraception.  We were told back in 1968 by Pope Paul VI in Humanae Vitae:

Finally, careful consideration should be given to the danger of this power passing into the hands of those public authorities who care little for the precepts of the moral law. Who will blame a government which in its attempt to resolve the problems affecting an entire country resorts to the same measures as are regarded as lawful by married people in the solution of a particular family difficulty? Who will prevent public authorities from favoring those contraceptive methods which they consider more effective? Should they regard this as necessary, they may even impose their use on everyone. It could well happen, therefore, that when people, either individually or in family or social life, experience the inherent difficulties of the divine law and are determined to avoid them, they may give into the hands of public authorities the power to intervene in the most personal and intimate responsibility of husband and wife.

If we had listened to the message of our Lady of Fatima and had been praying the Rosary daily and making reparations, our government would have never felt empowered to move against the Church as it has done.  But in the last 50 years, Marian devotion in general and the practice of regularly praying the Rosary in particular have fallen significantly in the Church. The Rosary has been forgotten by the vast majority of Catholics, as shown in the poll taken by Georgetown in 2008:

Eight percent of Catholics report that they pray the rosary at least once a week.

Another 8 percent of Catholics pray the rosary at least once a month, but less than weekly. One in five do so a few times a year and about one in six (16 percent) do so less than once a year.

Nearly half of Catholics (48 percent) report that they rarely or never pray the rosary. In a 2001 CARA poll, more than four-tenths of Catholics (44 percent) reported that they pray the rosary at least a few times a year. This compares to 36 percent in the present survey.

Our Lady asked us to pray the Rosary daily, and only 8 percent of Catholics pray it even weekly.  Is it just coincidence that at the same time as devotion to our Blessed Mother has faded, the faith of many Catholics has grown either lukewarm or completely died?   It is through her that Christ first came to earth, and it is through her that we must go to Christ. There can be no renewal of faith without the Blessed Mother, and now our Holy Father seeks to remind us of that.

Pope Benedict has declared October 2012 through November 2013 to be the Year of Faith.  The Holy Father is encouraging all Catholics to use this year to rediscover and deepen our faith and to share our faith with others.  This is desperately needed as only 20% of Catholics in the United States attend weekly Mass, and the numbers are dismally lower in Europe and Britain.  Far too many Catholics are woefully ignorant of the teachings of their own Church.  Pope Benedict XVI seems to be trying to remedy this tragic development with the The Year of Faith, which is all about renewing and revitalizing the faith of Catholics, and I find it highly significant that he is putting our Blessed Mother at the center of this.

This past Sunday, on the Feast of our Lady of Victory, Pope Benedict XVI, in his Angelus address after Mass, urged us, in connection with the Year of Faith, to dedicate ourselves to "renew the prayer of the Rosary".

Vatican News gives us the transcript of the Pope's remarks:

Dear Brothers and Sisters,

We now turn in prayer to Mary, whom we venerate today as Queen of the Holy Rosary. At this time, at the Shrine of Pompeii [see below], the traditional "Supplication"  is being elevated to which countless people throughout the world are joined [this prayer is traditionally said at the Shrine and around the world right at the time the Pope was speaking.  Click on link for prayer]. While we associate ourselves spiritually in this choral prayer, I would like to suggest to everyone to renew the prayer of the Rosary in the upcoming Year of Faith. With the Rosary, we allow ourselves to be guided by Mary, model of faith, in meditating on the mysteries of Christ, and day after day we are helped to assimilate the Gospel, so that it shapes all our lives. Therefore, in the wake of my predecessors, especially the Blessed John Paul II, who ten years ago gave us the Apostolic Letter Rosarium Virginis Mariae, I invite you to pray the Rosary personally, in the family and in the community, learning at the school of Mary, which leads us to Christ, the living centre of our faith.

The icon of Our Lady of the Rosary of Pompeii 

presents the image of the Madonna with 

Jesus in her arms, and at her feet are

St. Dominic and St. Catherine of Siena

Mentioning the Shrine of Pompeii shows even further the emphasis that our Holy Father is placing upon the importance of the Blessed Mother in the renewal of faith.  The Shrine of Pompeii is considered the most important Marian shrine in Italy, visited by four million people every year.  From Wikipedia:

Bartolo Longo started restoring a church in disrepair in October 1873 and promoted a festival in honor of Our Lady of the Rosary. In 1875, Longo obtained a painting of Our Lady of the Rosary from a convent in Naples and raised funds to restore the image so as to locate it in the church.

Miracles began to be reported and pilgrims began flocking in droves to the church. Bartolo Longo was encouraged by Giuseppe Formisano,Bishop of Nola, to begin the construction of a larger church—the cornerstone being laid on the 8 May 1876. The church was consecrated on the 7 May 1891 by Cardinal Raffaele Monaco La Valletta, representing Pope Leo XIII.

Notice, too, that the Pope is not talking about only individual prayer but prayer with others "in the family and in the community". The Rosary can bring us together and revitalize our faith. No one has ever gone astray when they draw close to our Blessed Mother. From the time of her Immaculate Conception she has been at one with the Holy Trinity. We can always find our Lord when we find Mary. Her motherly love for us is all about bringing us to her Son.

Below are the 15 promises given to us by our Blessed Mother if we will regularly and consistently pray the Rosary. Each and every promise made here will change the world, driving out the evil that surrounds us:

1. Whoever shall faithfully serve me by the recitation of the Rosary, shall receive signal graces.

2. I promise my special protection and the greatest graces to all those who shall recite the Rosary.

3. The Rosary will be a powerful armor against hell. It will destroy vice, decrease sin and defeat heresies.

4. It will cause virtue and good works to flourish; it will obtain for souls the abundant mercy of God; it will withdraw the hearts of men from the love of the world and its vanities, and will lift them to the desire of eternal things. Oh, that souls would sanctify themselves by this means.

5. Those who recommend themselves to me by the recitation of the Rosary shall not perish.

6. Whoever shall recite the Rosary devoutly, applying himself to the consideration of its sacred Mysteries shall never be conquered by misfortune. God will not chastise him in His justice, he shall not perish by an unprovided death; if he be just, he shall remain in the grace of God, and become worthy of eternal life.

7. Whoever shall have a true devotion for the Rosary shall not die without the sacraments of the Church.

8. Those who are faithful to recite the Rosary shall have during their life and at their death, the light of God and the plentitude of His graces; at the moment of death they shall participate in the merits of the saints in paradise.

9. I shall deliver from purgatory those who have been devoted to the Rosary.

10. The faithful children of the Rosary shall merit a high degree of glory in heaven.

11. You shall obtain all you ask of me by the recitation of the Rosary.

12. All those who propagate the holy Rosary shall be aided by me in their necessities.

13. I have obtained from my Divine Son that all the advocates of the Rosary shall have for intercessors the entire celestial court during their life and at the hour of death.

14. All who recite the Rosary are my sons, and brothers of my only son, Jesus Christ.

15. Devotion to my Rosary is a great sign of predestination.

We are all wringing our hands and wondering what to do about the oppressive government in our country.  The answer will not be found in politics or science or the humanities.  With all due respect to our bishops, the answer is not even in campaigns about "religious freedom."  Three small children at Fatima knew the answer that the best minds of our time haven't been able to figure out.  We are our brother's keeper. It is our Christian duty to pray for others and do penances and reparations on the part of others.  That is what the "community of saints" is all about.  Our Blessed Mother holds her loving arms out to us and longs to give us the answer if we will only turn to her.  The Vicar of Christ has pointed the way to her.  Let us turn to her in prayer and supplication and allow her to lead us to her Son.

Below is the trailer to the movie, "The 13th Day" about the story of Fatima.  I think this trailer speaks volumes about the answers to the evil we face in this world.

Meditation on First Joyful Mystery of the Rosary: Mary's Role In Our Salvation

Yesterday, October 6, was the First Saturday of the Month. The First Saturday Devotion to the Immaculate Heart of Mary was first mentioned by Our Lady of Fatima on July 13, 1917. After showing the three children a vision of hell she said, "You have seen hell where the souls of poor sinners go. To save them, God wishes to establish in the world devotion to my Immaculate Heart. If what I say to you is done, many souls will be saved and there will be peace... I shall come to ask for... the Communion of reparation on the first Saturdays..." The First Saturday devotion is as follows:

It consists in going to Confession, receiving Communion, reciting five decades of the Rosary and meditating for a quarter of an hour on the mysteries of the Rosary on the first Saturday of five consecutive months. The Confession may be made during the eight days preceding or following the first Saturday of each month, provided that Holy Communion be received in the state of grace. Should one forget to form the intention of making reparation to the Immaculate Heart of Mary, it may be formed at the next Confession, occasion to go to confession being taken at the first opportunity.

Battle of Lepanto

Coincidentally, today is the Feast of of the Most Holy Rosary of the BVM.  The reason for this feast is that on October 7, 1571, the Muslim Turks, known as the Ottoman Empire, were defeated by the European Christians, known as the Hapsburg Empire.  It was the time of the Protestant revolt against the Church causing great turmoil in Europe, and the Muslims felt this was a most opportune time to attack. 

The fate of all Europe hung in the balance.  If the Muslims were victorious, Christianity, both Catholic and Protestant, would be crushed and Sharia law would be the law of the land.  As Integrated Catholic Life tells us:

This feast day of the Church (October 7) finds its origins in the defeat of the Turkish fleet by Christian naval forces at Lepanto on October 7, 1571. The victory was attributed by Pope Pius V to Mary’s intercession as people all across Europe prayed the Rosary on that day for victory. As a result, he established the Feast of Our Lady of Victory in thanksgiving to God.

This began as a local feast. In 1716, Pope Clement XI made this a feast of the universal Church. The name as we know it today was adopted in 1573. 

Catholic Culture tells us that the Christians were badly outnumbered at the Battle of Lepanto:

The Turks had an estimated 328 ships, of which 208 were galleys, the rest being smaller supporting craft. Aboard them were nearly 77,000 men, including 10,000 Janissaries, but also 50,000 oarsmen, many of them Christian slaves. At Don Juan's command were 206 galleys, along with 40,000 oarsmen and sailors, and more than 28,000 soldiers, knights, and gentleman adventurers. He also had the blessings of the pope and the papal banner; the ministrations of Jesuits, Dominicans, Franciscans, and Capuchins who accompanied the fleet, the prayers of the faithful; and the rosaries that were pressed into the hands of every Christian oarsman.  

The results of the battle:

Not only was the battle lost for the Turk, but so were 170 of his galleys and 33,000 men killed, wounded, or captured, as well as 12,000 liberated Christian slaves. Lost was a generation of experienced Ottoman bowmen and seamen; and though a mighty fleet could, and indeed was, rebuilt, and though the sultan was committed to renewing the jihad by sea — or if not by sea, then by land — the threat of the Ottoman Turks dominating the Mediterranean was finished.

Catholic losses were 7,500 dead — though many of these were knights and noblemen — and another 22,000 wounded (including Miguel de Cervantes). Pope Pius V, who had commanded the faithful to pray the rosary for victory, was convinced that it was prayer that had turned the tide. The Battle of Lepanto became the feast day of Our Lady of Victory, later of Our Lady of the Rosary.

Our Lady of Victory

Pope Pius V was the Pope who gave us the Tridentine Council and all the wonderful things connected with that council, including the official Tridentine Mass. 

Integrated Catholic Life quotes from an encyclical of Pope Leo XIII regarding this tremendous victory entitled Supremi Apostolatus Officio:

“The efficacy and power of this devotion was also wondrously exhibited in the sixteenth century, when the vast forces of the Turks threatened to impose on nearly the whole of Europe the yoke of superstition and barbarism. At that time the Supreme Pontiff, St. Pius V., after rousing the sentiment of a common defence among all the Christian princes, strove, above all, with the greatest zeal, to obtain for Christendom the favour of the most powerful Mother of God. So noble an example offered to heaven and earth in those times rallied around him all the minds and hearts of the age. And thus Christ’s faithful warriors, prepared to sacrifice their life and blood for the salvation of their faith and their country, proceeded undauntedly to meet their foe near the Gulf of Corinth, while those who were unable to take part formed a pious band of supplicants, who called on Mary, and unitedly saluted her again and again in the words of the Rosary, imploring her to grant the victory to their companions engaged in battle. Our Sovereign Lady did grant her aid; for in the naval battle by the Echinades Islands, the Christian fleet gained a magnificent victory, with no great loss to itself, in which the enemy were routed with great slaughter. And it was to preserve the memory of this great boon thus granted, that the same Most Holy Pontiff desired that a feast in honour of Our Lady of Victories should celebrate the anniversary of so memorable a struggle, the feast which Gregory XIII. dedicated under the title of “The Holy Rosary.” Similarly, important successes were in the last century gained over the Turks at Temeswar, in Pannonia, and at Corfu; and in both cases these engagements coincided with feasts of the Blessed Virgin and with the conclusion of public devotions of the Rosary. And this led our predecessor, Clement XL, in his gratitude, to decree that the Blessed Mother of God should every year be especially honoured in her Rosary by the whole Church.” (Pope Leo XIII; Supremi Apostolatus Officio, 4; September 1, 1883). 

It has become my custom to post my meditation on one of the mysteries of the Rosary on the First Saturday of each month.  I recently did a post on the First Joyful Mystery, which is the annunciation of the angel Gabriel to our Blessed Mother in which the angel Gabriel announces to the young girl Mary that she has been chosen by the  Creator of the Universe to be the Mother of God. Normally I like to vary my meditations among the various mysteries of the Rosary. However, this is October, which is the month of the Rosary, and since this is the Feast of of the Most Holy Rosary of the BVM, I would like to concentrate on the importance of our Blessed Mother's role in the history and salvation of mankind.

So this month I am going back to the First Joyful Mystery, in which our Lady's answer to the Trinity changed not the history of just one country, but of the entire world for all time.  Mary was a young Jewish girl, whose nation had been enslaved by the Romans.  The Jews were a part of the once powerful nation of Israel which had been handpicked by God to be a witness to the world of God's glory.  Approximately 1500 years before this time, the Israelites had been slaves in the land of Egypt.  They were rescued by God, who had rescued them from slavery and made them into a nation.  But they squandered this magnificent blessing through grave sin and disobedience down through the generations and had been enslaved first by the Persians and now by the Romans. 

Mary lived in the forgotten land of Nazareth in a city called Galilee ruled over by the Romans.  Her family had no standing in society at all.  They were poor people in a poor land.  The consensus among people at that time is found in John 1:46 - "Can any thing of good come from Nazareth?"  To use an analogy, Haiti may be the poorest and most downtrodden country in the world.  Would that be where we would expect a Savior to arise? 

Yet, it was to a young and most likely uneducated girl in the forgotten land of Nazareth that the angel Gabriel appeared.  He greeted her in a most unusual way:

Hail, full of grace, the Lord is with thee: blessed art thou among women.

This is a simple statement, but one packed with awesome meaning. 

"Hail, full of grace."  This means that Mary had no sin attributed to her.  She was completely filled with God's grace, a perfect human being unstained by the world.  She was like one who lived in a garbage dump and yet no taint of any of the dirty, foul smelling debris with which she was surrounded had attached itself to her.  She was completely pristine and pure.  Not even the original sin of our first parents, inherited by all human beings, tainted Mary.  Never once did she have a vain or selfish thought or action, never once was she angry or harsh with another human being, she never once spoke a cross word.  She was completely filled with the Love of God.  The world had never seen such a human being. 

"The Lord is with thee."  The devil lays claim to each and every human being when they are born.  Unless and until we are baptized and receive the Holy Spirit, we are the property of Satan and completely cut off from God.  But the Blessed Mother was never contaminated by sin at any time in her life.  From the time of her Immaculate Conception, she was at one with the Trinity.  Satan never had any claim to her.  She was completely at one with God.  Where Mary was, there was the Triune God.  They were never separated. 

"Blessed are thou among women."  Through mother Eve, all women received a curse from God.  Gen 3:16:

To the woman also he said: I will multiply thy sorrows, and thy conceptions: in sorrow shalt thou bring forth children, and thou shalt be under thy husband's power, and he shall have dominion over thee.

Mary did not know the sorrow of other women.  The only one who had dominion over Mary was the Creator God.  The children born to all other women were conceived through the sin of this world and born into sin, bringing deep sorrow and pain.  No other woman was pure enough to be the Temple of God, the living Ark of the Covenant, as our Blessed Mother was.  Only she was blessed and able to bear the Son of God.

It should be noted that although our Blessed Mother did not suffer from the sorrow that afflicted all other women, her suffering was actually much deeper and more severe in that she sacrificed her Son to save the world. 

The angel Gabriel then made an astounding statement that only the simple and humble could understand.  Those who were highly educated and the elite of this word would never understand this message or accept it.  Luke 1:30-33:

And the angel said to her: Fear not, Mary, for thou hast found grace with God.

Behold thou shalt conceive in thy womb, and shalt bring forth a son; and thou shalt call his name Jesus.

He shall be great, and shall be called the Son of the most High; and the Lord God shall give unto him the throne of David his father; and he shall reign in the house of Jacob for ever.

And of his kingdom there shall be no end.

This was the most momentous moment in the history of man up to that time.  The entire fate of mankind rested upon the answer of this young girl.  She has been specially prepared and preserved from sin to be the Ark of the New Covenant, the Theotokos, the God Bearer.  She was the one who would give the nature of man to the God of the Universe.  It was this nature that would enable Him to die upon a Cross and through the saving power of his Precious Blood, rescue mankind from Satan and eternal damnation in hell.  But Mary still had free will.  She was as free to say No as our first parents were.  Just as our Lord was forced to cast Adam and Eve out of the Garden and forbid them access to the Tree of Life because they said No to Him, Our Lord could not save mankind without the cooperation and the "Yes" of this young girl.

The young girl answered:

Behold the handmaid of the Lord; be it done to me according to thy word.

 It was at her Yes that we are told in John 1:14:

And the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us.

Jesus is our Saviour.  It is only through his Sacrifice that we can be saved from our sins.  But he chose to do this through His Blessed Mother, Mary.  Mary was prepared and chosen by God to be the Mother of the One who would rescue all of mankind from our evil adversary, Satan, and from eternal damnation.  Mary was not a robot or an android of some kind.  She was as human as you and I are, with one BIG exception.  She was not stained by sin.  However, our first parents were created without the stain of sin, and that did not keep them from falling. 

All of the saints have realized just how vital Mary is to our salvation.  They all knew that we receive salvation from Christ only through the Blessed Mother.  It was only because of her Yes that he was able to come to earth as a man, and it is only our Yes through her that we can go to Christ.

St. Augustine of Hippo lived from 354 to 430 A.D.  This was before many of the dogmas of the Virgin Mary had been codified by the Church.  At the time of St. Augustine, the only official Marian dogma of the Church was that she was a perpetual virgin.  She had not even been officially acknowledged as the Mother of God, although most held this to be true.  This official dogma was not declared until 431 at the Council of Ephesus, a year after St. Augustine's death.  This was long before she had given us the Rosary through St. Dominic.  Yet, even at the time of St. Augustine, the Church was aware of the magnificent and vital role our Blessed Mother plays in our salvation.  This Prayer of Saint Augustine to the Blessed Virgin shows his profound understanding of Mary's Role in our salvation:

O blessed Virgin Mary, who can worthily repay thee thy just dues of praise and thanksgiving, thou who by the wondrous assent of thy will didst rescue a fallen world? What songs of praise can our weak human nature recite in thy honor, since it is by thy intervention alone that it has found the way to restoration. Accept, then, such poor thanks as we have here to offer, though they be unequal to thy merits; and receiving our vows, obtain by thy prayers the remission of our offenses. Carry thou our prayers within the sanctuary of the heavenly audience, and bring forth from it the antidote of our reconciliation. May the sins we bring before Almighty God through thee, become pardonable through thee; may what we ask for with sure confidence, through thee be granted. Take our offering, grant us our requests, obtain pardon for what we fear, for thou art the sole hope of sinners. Through thee we hope for the remission of our sins, and in thee, O blessed Lady, is our hope of reward. Holy Mary, succour the miserable, help the fainthearted, comfort the sorrowful, pray for thy people, plead for the clergy, intercede for all women consecrated to God; may all who keep thy holy commemoration feel now thy help and protection. Be thou ever ready to assist us when we pray, and bring back to us the answers to our prayers. Make it thy continual care to pray for the people of God, thou who, blessed by God, didst merit to bear the Redeemer of the world, who liveth and reigneth, world without end. Amen.

Our Blessed Lady is always here for us.  She appeared at Guadalupe, Mexico and through her appearance stopped the human slaughter being carried out by the Aztec Indians and brought about the conversion of 9 million Mexicans.  The Mexicans to this day still give our Lady of Guadalupe deep and heartfelt honor and glory.

Our Lady gives the Scapular
to St. Simon Stock

Our Lady gave the rosary to St. Dominic to stop heresies.  The Rosary is still one of our of our most powerful spiritual weapons.  St. Dominic said, "One day, through the rosary and scapular, she will save the world."  The Brown Scapular, given to St. Simon Stock in 1251, is so powerful that our Lady promises that, "Whosoever dies wearing this Scapular shall not suffer eternal fire."

The Brown Scapular

The victory of the Battle of Lepanto through the Rosary is just one example of Our Blessed Mother's constant intercession on our behalf.  If we put our total trust in her, we can never fail.  The devil had no power over Mary, and he will have no power over her trustful and devoted children. 

“When the Holy Spirit finds Mary in a soul, He enters that soul completely and communicates Himself completely to that soul.”

St. Louis de Montfort