Song of Songs 4:12

Song of Songs 4:12                          *(see note)

You are a garden enclosed, my sister, my bride; a spring enclosed, a sealed fountain. 

Mary is the garden enclosed that the writer of the Song of Songs speaks of.  She is the sister and bride of the Holy Spirit.  The power of the Father comes upon her, the Holy Spirit overshadows her, the Son becomes incarnate in her womb.  He grows there in secret for nine months embellishing this garden with every grace, blessing and virtue.  She is radiant with the radiance of God emanating from her.  Her body and her soul were conceived in the heart and mind of the the Almighty God, the God of all ages - Master Designer and Master Creator of this, His divine masterpiece.  There never was and there never shall be another creature as lovely, good, pure, sweet, gentle, noble and grace-filled as Mary - my Mother, my Mama, my Queen.

NOTE:

To highlight Mary's chastity, her effigy is surrounded by two of the classical symbols of Our Lady's virginity, namely:

Hortus conclusus

(enclosed garden)

Fons signatus

(sealed fountain)

Both symbols appear in the Song of Songs, "You are. . .my sister, my bride, an enclosed garden, a fountain sealed." (Canticle 4, 12).

The typical half-image of Mother and child form the crown of a tree which bears simultaneously, flowers and fruit. They are symbols of Mary's role as simultaneously virgin (flower) and mother (fruit).

Song of Songs 2:8-14, Psalm 33:11-12, 20-21

She

The voice of my lover! Behold he comes, springing across the mountains, jumping over the hills, like a gazelle or a young stag. Now he stands behind our wall, looking through the windows, peering through the lattice.  My lover speaks to me,

 

He

“Arise, my love, my beautiful one!  Come, the winter is gone, the rains are over.  Flowers have appeared on earth; the season of singing has come; the cooing of doves is heard.  The fig tree forms its early fruit, the vines in blossom are fragrant.  Arise, my beautiful one, come with me, my love, come.  O my dove in the rocky cleft, in the secret places of the cliff, let me see your face, let me hear your voice.  Your face – how lovely!  Your voice – how sweet!”

My Beloved, You always speak the words I need to hear.  Thank You for telling me once more how passionately You love me.  My life my love, my being is Yours my own true God.  I give it all to You through Mary.

Psalm 33:11-12, 20-21

But His plan stands forever, and his heart’s design through all generations.  Blessed is the nation whose God is the Lord – the people he has chosen for his inheritance.  In hope we wait for the Lord, for He is our help and our shield.  Our hearts rejoice in Him, for we trust in His holy Name.

All that You say to me today makes my heart leap for  joy.

Psalm 85:11-14

Psalm 85:11-14

Love and faithfulness have met; righteousness and peace have  embraced.  Faithfulness will reach up from the earth while justice bends down from heaven.  The Lord will give what is good, and our land will yield its fruit.  Justice will go before him, and peace will follow along his path.

My Beloved, how clear it becomes once the Holy Spirit points out how God reached down to ask for Mary's cooperation and she reached up in faith and humility; to allow God complete freedom to accomplish His plan, using her as His instrument to bring it about.  May I too always say yes to Your will and plan for my life.

Numbers 24:7

NUMBERS 24:7

His buckets are overflowing and his seeds are always watered.

"My child, You know the truth but unless you apply it to your life there will be no growth.  Your will must cooperate with the grace that I freely give in order that you may produce lasting fruit.  The angels, the saints and above all my Mother are rooting for you and cheering you on because they see your desire to please Me.  But just good desires are  not enough to achieve your goal of sanctity.  To the desire must be added your will - a firm unshakeable will, only then can you become what you desire.

The seeds I plant are always well watered by My Holy Spirit but the soil must be good.  I have not told you these things to make you sad but you must know that anything worth having is worth fighting for.  In this is victory."

"Thank You my Beloved for speaking to me."

Psalm 1:2-4, Isaiah 48:17-19

My Beloved, the psalmist says that we are blessed when we find our delight in Your law and meditate on Your commandments day and night.  We will find ourselves like a tree beside a brook producing fruit in due season and everything we do will be a success. The same thought is expressed by the prophet Isaiah but differently.

Isaiah 48:17-19

Thus says Yahweh, your Redeemer, the Holy One of Israel:  I, Yahweh your God, teach you what is best for you; I lead you in the way that you must go.  Had you paid attention to my commandments, your peace would have been like a river, your righteousness like the waves of the sea.  your descendants would have been like the sand and those born of your stock like its grains, their names never cut off nor blotted out from my Presence.

My Beloved, for a long time I have had this desire to tithe on my heart.  I have been praying about it as You know - if this is something that You wish me to initiate my Lord, then I as Your slave as well as Mama's, desire to carry out Your will.  I believe that if this is from You then You will be with me and help me.  Time will tell.  Thank You my Lord.

"Be like the child who gave his 5 loaves and 2 fish to Me and with it I was able to feed a multitude."

My Beloved, today the Church celebrates Your Kingship.  You are the King of the universe, of the heavens and the earth.  You are the Lord of life.  You rule over all things and Your Kingdom will never end.  You rule from age to age and Your Kingdom which is eternal will last forever.

You my Beloved are the Lord and Master of my life.  You rule over my home.  You are King of our family.  I acknowledge Your Kingship over every area of my life.  I bow down in worship and adoration that You whom the heavens cannot contain and for whom the earth is a mere footstool loves me and wants me to be in intimate union with You.  I can only say, "Yes, Lord.  Unworthy as I am You can have all that I am.  Rule me, fill me. sanctify me.  Thank You for all the riches You lavish on me from the treasury of Your graces - love, joy, peace, faith, hope and every other good gift and virtue. Amen."

My Beloved, grant me this grace, to believe and live by this truth that says, 'In life and in death I am Yours.'  I belong to You, first, last and forever.  Yours to do with as You will.  My life is Yours, My love is Yours, my heart, soul, mind, body and spirit are Yours.  Every heartbeat, every pulse beat, every breath I breathe is Yours.  I am all Yours my Beloved.

Psalm 50:15, Luke 19:41

Psalm 50:15

Call on me in time of calamity; I will deliver You and you will glorify me.

Beloved, thank You for this assurance.  Please hear my prayers for my family and for everyone I pray for every day.  Console, comfort and bless each one my Lord.

Luke 19:41

When Jesus had come in sight of Jerusalem, he wept over it.

My Beloved Jesus, You wept over Jerusalem.  Do You weep over the world today?  It seems that despite all that we know of You and of the truth, we still refuse to live it.  We deny it, we compromise it.  We make truth a lie and lie the truth.  Have pity on us Your foolish children and help us.

"My Beloved, You seem so distant, my love so puny, there is a feeling of sadness inside.  Help me!"

"Don't go by feelings they come and go.  Go by My Word which is unchanging which is the same today, tomorrow and forever.  My Word says, ask and you shall receive, seek and you will find, knock and the door will be opened to you.  Anyone who who comes to Me with a humble contrite heart will find Me because I am already standing at the door and knocking, waiting for an invitation to come into a deep and abiding relationship with anyone who desires it.  Do not be disheartened or dismayed just believe.  All things are possible to those who believe."

My Beloved, deliver me from false humility.  Yes, I am nothing but I want You to fill me with all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge that You wish to give me.  Give me a receptive heart and a willing spirit.  Teach me Your ways.  Let me walk in Your path.

My Beloved, You constantly call all souls to conversion but we live in a world of noise and so we cannot hear You.  Then suddenly some event occurs and all the sound comes to a grinding halt and we hear the Voice that has been calling all the time, "This is the way, come walk in it."

Wisdom 7:22--8:1

Wisdom7:22--8:1

For in her is the spirit of understanding; holy, one, manifold, subtile, eloquent, active, undefiled, sure, sweet, loving that which is good, quick, which nothing hindereth, beneficent, Gentle, kind, steadfast, assured, secure, having all power, overseeing all things, and containing all spirits: intelligible, pure, subtile: For wisdom is more active than all active things; and reacheth everywhere, by reason of her purity. For she is a vapour of the power of God, and a certain pure emanation of the glory of the Almighty God: and therefore no defiled thing cometh into her.  For she is the brightness of eternal light, and the unspotted mirror of God's majesty, and the image of his goodness.

And being but one, she can do all things: and remaining in herself the same, she reneweth all things, and through nations conveyeth herself into holy souls, she maketh the friends of God and prophets.  For God loveth none but him that dwelleth with wisdom.  For she is more beautiful than the sun, and above all the order of the stars: being compared with the light, she is found before it.  For after this cometh night, but no evil can overcome wisdom.  She reacheth, therefore, from end to end mightily, and ordereth all things sweetly.

My Beloved, what a beautiful hymn to wisdom and You embody it.  The good news is that wisdom can penetrate all things and so she can enter my soul with her light and grace.  Fill me with Your Holy Spirit in and grant me this gift that I may be possessed by her. 


Wisdom is the jewel that is pinned to Mary's breast.


The Holy Eucharist is an experience.  It is an entering into the Person of Jesus Christ in His divinity and  humanity and becoming one with Him.


My verbal skills lack the ability to enunciate the wonder of this Sacrament but my heart knows because it has experienced it and I pray that my life bears witness to it.

Wisdom 6:10-11, Luke 17:16 & 19

Wisdom 6:10-11

For those who keep the holy laws in a holy way will be acknowledged holy, those who accept the teaching will find in it their defence.  Welcome my words, desire them and they will instruct you.

Luke 17:16 & 19

One of them, as soon as he saw he was cleansed, turned back praising God in a loud voice, and throwing himself on his face before Jesus, he gave him thanks.  And Jesus said to him, "Stand up and go your way; your faith has saved you."

Beloved, every good and perfect gift comes from You.  I ask O Lord that I may be given the grace to love like You, think like You, act like You.  To be like You in all things.  Teach me to become nothing in order that You may so possess me that there is no longer any I - it is all You in me.

My Beloved, like the leper who returned to give thanks I too fall on my face and thank You for Your graciousness in stooping down, loving me and raising me up to new life and making me one with You.  Thank You Lord.

DEDICATION OF ST. JOHN LATERAN

THE ONE, HOLY, CATHOLIC AND APOSTOLIC CHURCH FOUNDED BY

 OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST

My Beloved, I thank You with humble gratitude for the Church.  It is a place where millions like me find a home.  In Your house there is a welcome for all; the rich, the poor, the beggar and the thief.  You draw all to Yourself in love.  You bathe  us in the waters of baptism.  You restore our souls freed from sin and death in the Sacrament of Reconciliation. You feed us and give us strength for the journey with Your own most precious Body and Blood in the Holy Eucharist.  One day You will welcome us home in the eternal Kingdom of Heaven.  For all this my Beloved I offer You my most humble thanks. 

Luke 16:10, 13-15

Luke 16:10, 13-15

"Whoever can be trusted in little things can also be trusted in great ones, whoever is dishonest in slight matters will also be dishonest in greater ones.  No servant can serve two masters.  Either he does not like the one and is fond of the other, or he regards one highly and the other with contempt.  You cannot give yourself both to God and money."  The Pharisees, who  loved money, heard all this and sneered at Jesus.  Jesus said to them, "You do your best to be considered righteous by people.  But God knows the heart, and what rises high among humans is loathed by God."

My Beloved, so often we are not faithful in little things and that is why we make little or no progress at all.  We remain where we are and cannot become holy and perfect - in short saints, as You have invited each one of us.  We have to struggle all the time to overcome our sinful natures.  This is the sacrifice most pleasing to You - the daily sacrifice of fighting and overcoming and making progress however small in our growth in You.  It is the struggle that is so pleasing to You.

Romans 14:8, 10,12

A TRUE CHILD OF GOD WOULD HURT NO ONE EITHER IN THOUGHT WORD OR DEED.

Romans 14:8, 10, 12

If we live, we live for the Lord, and if we die, we die for the Lord.  Either in life or death we belong to the Lord.  Then, why do  you criticize your brother or sister? And you, why do you despise them? For we will all appear at the tribunal of God.  So each of us will account for himself before God.

Beloved, thank You for reminding me that my only duty is to love and to forgive.  I can leave the judging of my neighbor to You, for as You rightly point out to me, each of us will account for himself before You. 

To the extent I open myself to Your love - whether consciously or unconsciously, to that extent alone can I experiece Your love.  It is I who limit You.  I don't want to - I want all of You my Beloved but You must teach me how to hunger, thirst and yearn for You every moment of every day.  This is what I want in my head.  Sweet Spirit of God grant me the grace to let the desire in my head become the desire of my heart and my very being.

I know I can trust my God to seek the lost, to save the sinner, to leave nothing unturned in the seeking and to triumphantly carry the sinner home on His shoulders.  My responsibility is to pray.

My Beloved, the way we live our lives now will have eternal consequences.  I thank You for my conversion.  Had You called me home when I was in sin I may have been lost  eternally, or I would most certainly have had to spend a long, long while in purgatory. 

More than the fear of eternal damnation and punishment is that my knowledge of You and my love for You are such wonderful experiences.  The exciting, new, personal discoveries I make daily about the depth and extent of Your boundless love, Your amazing humility in loving me, waiting for me, longing for me to spend time with You are such a source of delight that I wish to spend all my waking moments with You. 

Thank You my Beloved.

Matthew 5:1-12

MATTHEW 5:1-12

I am a child of God.  This dignity is conferred on me by the Father through the Son in the Holy Spirit.  It is through the Sacrament of Baptism that I have died in Christ. I am grafted into Him and I am born again - I am a new creation and it is the Spirit that enable me to cry out, "Abba, Father."  It is the work of the Triune God that confers on me the dignity of being a daughter of the Most High God.  This is what I am through the merits won for me by Jesus.

As a daughter of God and through the rich graces bestowed on me and with the help of the Holy Spirit available to me all the time, I can strive to be pure with the help of His grace.  My beloved Jesus, as the new Moses, You have shown Your disciples and the whole world how to live as one chosen by God in the world through the beatitudes.  Help me Jesus to make the beatitudes a way of life for me.  Amen. 

Psalm 94:18, Luke 14:11

Psalm 94:18

No sooner did I say, "My foot is slipping," Your kindness O God  held me up.

Luke 14:11

Whoever makes himself out to be great will be humbled and whoever humbles himself will be raised.

Humility is a coin of great value and is appreciated greatly in God's Kingdom.  The more we are willing to offer ourselves in humble service to God and to one another, the greater will God be able to move and act in us.  The marks of a follower of Christ are humility and obedience.  Sometimes my Beloved, pride gets in the way and it is hard to bend in submission.  I try Beloved, but You who know all things know that I experience a little resentment.  Help me O my God to be truly humble all the time.  Amen.

Romans 9:1, Psalm 147:13, Luke 14:1-6

Romans 9:1

I tell you sincerely in Christ, and my conscience assures me in the Holy Spirit that I am not lying: I have great sadness and constant anguish for the Jews.

My Beloved, after reading this Scripture verse I realise that I feel the same sadness because some of my own family members are not only far away from You but are quite uninterested in getting any closer.  Thank You for speaking a word of consolation to me in Psalm 147:13 "He strengthens the bars of your gates and blesses your children within you."  I know that I can trust You to keep Your word my Lord and King.

Luke 14-1-6

My Beloved, the pharisees deliberately set out to trap You on that Sabbath by bringing that man sufffering from dropsy and making sure You saw him.  Their intentions were evil - but it was possible for You to draw good from their evil intentions.  You  healed him.  The pharisees were not prepared to answer Your questions because it would show them up for what they really were.  How often we too are like that.  We wait for people to trip up and fall and then we are ready to criticize.  Forgive me my Lord.

ROMANS 8:31-38, Luke 13:34

Luke 13:34

How often have I desired to gather your children together as a hen gathers her brood under her wings, and you were not willing!

Romans 8:31-39

What then are we to say about these things? If God is for us, who is against us? He who did not withhold his own Son, but gave him up for all of us, will he not with him also give us everything else? Who will bring any charge against God’s elect? It is God who justifies. Who is to condemn? It is Christ Jesus, who died, yes, who was raised, who is at the right hand of God, who indeed intercedes for us. Who will separate us from the love of Christ? Will hardship, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword? As it is written, ‘For your sake we are being killed all day long; we are accounted as sheep to be slaughtered.’ No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. For I am convinced that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor rulers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.

My Beloved, even before I read these beautiful verses You have spoken to me telling me that I am Yours.  You have spoken to me saying,

"Call Me and I will answer, look for Me and you will find me.  Ask anything for the salvation of your soul and you will receive it for I love you.  I have poured out my life for you in order that you might be saved and find a place with Me now and in eternity.  Nothing can separate you from My love save sin.  Lean your head against My breast, hear my heart beat with love for you.  My pierced heart still pours out streams of grace to empower you and help you to be all that God has called you to be."

Beloved there is something wonderful happening in the Church - give to Your servant Pope Benedict XVI the grace, strength, courage and the continuing vision to see it through supported by the prayers fo Your Holy Church.