READING 1
Luke 1:39-47

In those days Mary arose and went with haste into the hill country, to a city of Judah, and she entered the house of Zechariah and greeted Elizabeth. And when Elizabeth heard the greeting of Mary, the child leaped in her womb; and Elizabeth was filled with the Holy Spirit and she exclaimed with a loud cry, “Blessed are you among women, and blessed is the fruit of your womb! And why is this granted me, that the mother of my Lord should come to me? For behold, when the voice of your greeting came to my ears, the child in my womb leaped for joy. And blessed is she who believed that there would be a fulfilment of what was spoken to her from the Lord.” And Mary said, “My soul magnifies the Lord, and my spirit rejoices in God my Savior.”

READING 2
From a homily for the Assumption by Pope Benedict XVI, August15 , 2005

In the Gospel we heard the Magnificat, that great poem inspired by the Holy Spirit that came from Mary’s lips, indeed, from Mary’s heart. This marvellous canticle mirrors the entire soul, the entire personality of Mary. We can say that this hymn of hers is a portrait of Mary, a true icon in which we can see her exactly as she is. I would like to highlight only two points in this great canticle.¹

It begins with the word “Magnificat“: my soul “magnifies” the Lord, that is, “proclaims the greatness” of the Lord. Mary wanted God to be great in the world, great in her life and present among us all. She was not afraid that God might be a “rival” in our life, that with his greatness he might encroach on our freedom, our vital space. She knew that if God is great, we too are great. Our life is not oppressed but raised and expanded: it is precisely then that it becomes great in the splendour of God. The fact that our first parents thought the contrary was the core of original sin. They feared that if God were too great, he would take something away from their life. They thought that they could set God aside to make room for themselves.

This was also the great temptation of the modern age, of the past three or four centuries. More and more people have thought and said: “But this God does not give us our freedom; with all his commandments, he restricts the space in our lives. So God has to disappear; we want to be autonomous and independent. Without this God we ourselves would be gods and do as we pleased.”

This was also the view of the Prodigal Son, who did not realize that he was “free” precisely because he was in his father’s house. He left for distant lands and squandered his estate. In the end, he realized that precisely because he had gone so far away from his father, instead of being free he had become a slave; he understood that only by returning home to his father’s house would he be truly free, in the full beauty of life.

This is how it is in our modern epoch. Previously, it was thought and believed that by setting God aside and being autonomous, following only our own ideas and inclinations, we would truly be free to do whatever we liked without anyone being able to give us orders. But when God disappears, men and women do not become greater; indeed, they lose the divine dignity, their faces lose God’s splendour. In the end, they turn out to be merely products of a blind evolution and, as such, can be used and abused. This is precisely what the experience of our epoch has confirmed for us.

Only if God is great is humankind also great. With Mary, we must begin to understand that this is so. We must not drift away from God but make God present; we must ensure that he is great in our lives. Thus, we too will become divine; all the splendour of the divine dignity will then be ours. Let us apply this to our own lives.

REFLECTION

Mary celebrated God’s greatness and wanted Him to be magnified further. He is magnified when we give Him our yes. He grows in our hearts and becomes more visible in our lives. He grew so great in Mary that He became flesh in her womb. She opened herself totally to Him, withholding nothing from Him. She did not fear losing anything by making more and more room for Him in her life.

Recalling Pope Benedict XVI’s words from his inaugural homily, Are we not perhaps all afraid in some way? If we let Christ enter fully into our lives, if we open ourselves totally to him, are we not afraid that He might take something away from us? Are we not perhaps afraid to give up something significant, something unique, something that makes life so beautiful? Do we not then risk ending up diminished and deprived of our freedom? And once again the Pope [John Paul II] said: No! If we let Christ into our lives, we lose nothing, nothing, absolutely nothing of what makes life free, beautiful and great. No! Only in this friendship are the doors of life opened wide. Only in this friendship is the great potential of human existence truly revealed. Only in this friendship do we experience beauty and liberation.”

Mary can help us give this generous response to God as we pray with her that He would be magnified in our own heart and in every heart.

PRAYERS

O Holy Mary by John Henry Newman
Sub tuum praesidium
Litany of the Immaculate Heart of Mary or
Litany of Loreto or
at least one decade of the Rosary or
Prayer of Entrustment to the Womb of Mary

1. N.B. the second point is on Day 25. ↩︎

Copyright © 2026 by St. Vincent Archabbey

READING 1
Luke 2:8-19

And in that region there were shepherds out in the field, keeping watch over their flock by night. And an angel of the Lord appeared to them, and the glory of the Lord shone around them, and they were filled with fear. And the angel said to them, “Be not afraid; for behold, I bring you good news of a great joy which will come to all the people; for to you is born this day in the city of David a Savior, who is Christ the Lord. And this will be a sign for you: you will find a baby wrapped in swaddling cloths and lying in a manger.” And suddenly there was with the angel a multitude of the heavenly host praising God and saying, “Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace among men with whom he is pleased.” When the angels went away from them into heaven, the shepherds said to one another, “Let us go over to Bethlehem and see this thing that has happened, which the Lord has made known to us.” And they went with haste, and found Mary and Joseph, and the baby lying in a manger. And when they saw it they made known the saying which had been told them concerning this child; and all who heard it wondered at what the shepherds told them. But Mary kept all these things, pondering them in her heart.

READING 2
From Rosarium Virginis Mariae x 10-11 by Pope St. John Paul II

Mary, model of contemplation. The contemplation of Christ has an incomparable model in Mary. In a unique way the face of the Son belongs to Mary. It was in her womb that Christ was formed, receiving from her a human resemblance which points to an even greater spiritual closeness. No one has ever devoted himself to the contemplation of the face of Christ as faithfully as Mary. The eyes of her heart already turned to him at the Annunciation, when she conceived him by the power of the Holy Spirit. In the months that followed she began to sense his presence and to picture his features. When at last she gave birth to him in Bethlehem, her eyes were able to gaze tenderly on the face of her Son, as she “wrapped him in swaddling cloths, and laid him in a manger” (Lk 2:7).

Thereafter Mary’s gaze, ever filled with adoration and wonder, would never leave him. At times it would be a questioning look, as in the episode of the finding in the Temple: “Son, why have you treated us so?” (Lk 2:48); it would always be a penetrating gaze, one capable of deeply understanding Jesus, even to the point of perceiving his hidden feelings and anticipating his decisions, as at Cana (cf. Jn 2:5). At other times it would be a look of sorrow, especially beneath the Cross, where her vision would still be that of a mother giving birth, for Mary not only shared the passion and death of her Son, she also received the new son given to her in the beloved disciple (cf. Jn 19:26-27). On the morning of Easter hers would be a gaze radiant with the joy of the Resurrection, and finally, on the day of Pentecost, a gaze afire with the outpouring of the Spirit (cf. Acts 1:14).

Mary’s memories. Mary lived with her eyes fixed on Christ, treasuring his every word: “She kept all these things, pondering them in her heart” (Lk 2:19; cf. 2:51). The memories of Jesus, impressed upon her heart, were always with her, leading her to reflect on the various moments of her life at her Son’s side. In a way those memories were to be the “rosary” which she recited uninterruptedly throughout her earthly life.

REFLECTION

Mary gazed on the Heart of Jesus, her Son, with a contemplative vision. While she took in the events of His life with her human heart and felt at various moments the joy, anguish, confusion, sorrow and delight of what He was experiencing, she also gazed with eyes of faith. She took everything into her heart and pondered it, putting it together, with wonder and awe. She always sought to penetrate more deeply all the work of God that unfolded in her midst.

Mary continues to place all of God’s work in her heart, including the ways that grace unfolds in each person’s life. With a mother’s heart, she ponders the life events of each of her beloved children. As we approach her with childlike faith, she can help us to understand and accept more deeply all that God is doing in us. How much do you let Mary help you? Can you let her help you form a more contemplative gaze? Can you learn from her the mysteries of her Son and ponder them more deeply? Can you let her hold your heart and form it to be more like hers?

PRAYERS

O Holy Mary by John Henry Newman
Sub tuum praesidium
Litany of the Immaculate Heart of Mary or
Litany of Loreto or
at least one decade of the Rosary or
Prayer of Entrustment to the Womb of Mary

Copyright © 2026 by St. Vincent Archabbey

INTRODUCTION

“Our entire perfection consists in being conformed, united and consecrated to Jesus Christ. Hence the most perfect of all devotions is undoubtedly that which conforms, unites and consecrates us most perfectly to Jesus Christ. Now, since Mary is of all creatures the one most conformed to Jesus Christ, it follows that among all devotions that which most consecrates and conforms a soul to our Lord is devotion to Mary, his Holy Mother, and that the more a soul is consecrated to her the more will it be consecrated to Jesus Christ.”¹

After first getting in touch with and preparing our hearts we then drew close to the heart of St. Joseph. We received from the loving protection and care of his virtuous fatherhood and we began to admire and even imitate his virtues. One of the decisions of St. Joseph that was most foundational and profoundly virtuous in his life was his entering into a marriage with the Most Blessed Virgin Mary. We will follow his lead and allow our hearts to enter into closer relationship with hers. In so doing we can learn her heartbeat, including her great dreams, her tender sensitivity, and her eager openness to God’s will. We will learn from her how to respond to God, how to contemplate him in his mysteries, how to make more room for God in our lives, how to embrace humility, how to receive from her compassion and how to be deeply formed by the Word. Ultimately we will learn from her how to give our “genoïto,” to God like she did, to give Him our “yes” with joyous desire.

This will be the perfect preparation for entering into the ultimate phase of our consecration, the consecration to the Sacred Heart of Jesus. Mary was perfectly consecrated to Him and she will lead us to make the most perfect consecration we can make as well.

Our prayers this week will consist of two short prayers — one is the most ancient prayer to our Lady, the Sub Tuum Praesidium, and one is a short prayer by St. John Henry Newman. As a slightly longer devotion, the Litany of the Immaculate Heart by Newman, the classic Litany of Loreto, a decade of the Rosary, of the Prayer of Entrustment to the Womb of Mary, will help us meditate at greater length on our Lady’s beautiful heart and her expansive love — for Jesus and for us.

1. St. Louis De Montfort, Treatise on True Devotion to the Blessed Virgin Mary. ↩︎

Day 20: A Perfect Response: Mary’s Heart of Undivided Love

READING 1
Luke 1:26-33

In the sixth month the angel Gabriel was sent from God to a city of Galilee named Nazareth, to a virgin betrothed to a man whose name was Joseph, of the house of David; and the virgin’s name was Mary. And he came to her and said, “Hail, full of grace, the Lord is with you!” But she was greatly troubled at the saying, and considered in her mind what sort of greeting this might be. And the angel said to her, “Do not be afraid, Mary, for you have found favor with God. And behold, you will conceive in your womb and bear a son, and you shall call his name Jesus. He will be great, and will be called the Son of the Most High; and the Lord God will give to him the throne of his father David, and he will reign over the house of Jacob for ever; and of his kingdom there will be no end.”

READING 2
From Mother Teresa: In the Shadow of Our Lady by Fr. Joseph Langford, M.C.

When Mother Teresa speaks of Our Lady’s Immaculate Heart, she is pointing to the perfection of Mary’s love. How often she would speak of the desire to give “undivided love” to God and neighbor. The only one who had done this fully was Our Lady; she is the model, the goal, and the grace-filled means to achieve this ideal. Mother Teresa saw the heart of Our Lady as a model of all the virtues she held dear: humility, silence, thoughtfulness, haste in service.

When Mother Teresa speaks of Our Lady’s Immaculate Heart, she is pointing to the perfection of Mary’s love. How often she would speak of the desire to give “undivided love” to God and neighbor. The only one who had done this fully was Our Lady; she is the model, the goal, and the grace-filled means to achieve this ideal. Mother Teresa saw the heart of Our Lady as a model of all the virtues she held dear: humility, silence, thoughtfulness, haste in service.

Understandably then, Mother Teresa chose Our Lady’s Immaculate Heart as her patroness, and established its feast day as the titular feast of her religious order. While other Marian feasts celebrate some single event in the unfolding of Our Lady’s life, the feast of the Immaculate Heart points precisely to her inner life; not to something she did, but to the love with which she did everything. In the heart of Our Lady, Mother Teresa found a path and portal into the mystery of Jesus’ love for us. The heart of Our Lady represented for her mankind’s maximum response to God, our highest and fullest response to his thirst to love and be loved. The Immaculate Heart of Mary refers not only to Our Lady’s love and virtues, but also to her interior emptiness of self in imitation of Christ who “emptied himself” to save the human race. Our Lady’s heart is the most empty of all human hearts, the most empty of self and empty of pride, and therefore the most ready to give a heart’s welcome and shelter to those who are shelterless. Mother Teresa saw this as the condition both for receiving and giving God to the full.

Reflection

Mary’s heart is the maximum response to God’s thirst for our love. Marked by humility, silence, thoughtfulness and service, her heart ultimately expresses the way she did everything—with the greatest love. The heart represents her inner life and also symbolizes a shelter she opens up to us and to others.

When you hold up your heart next to our Lady’s, how maximal is your response to God? With how much love do you carry out the various duties of your day? How is your humility? Silence? Thoughtfulness? Haste in service? How much room have you made in your heart for God and for others? In answering these questions, do not allow shame or regret to enter in, but to the degree that you fall short, only let yourself feel your need and be confident in Mary’s maternal response to those needs, especially coming from her littlest children.

Prayers

O Holy Mary by John Henry Newman
Sub tuum praesidium
Litany of the Immaculate Heart of Mary or
Litany of Loreto or
at least one decade of the Rosary or
Prayer of Entrustment to the Womb of Mary

Copyright © 2026 by St. Vincent Archabbey