Reparatrix and Dispensatrix: Sweet hope in the midst of the bitterness of life

Mystical Rose! Happy feast of Our Lady of Guadalupe. She gives us hope in the midst of suffering. The thing about suffering is, she’s been there done that, and her response is our model. She really, really wants to help.

It is impossible to measure the power and scope of her offices…she who was so intimately associated with the mystery of human salvation is just as closely associated with the distribution of the graces which for all time will flow from the Redemption. The power thus put into her hands is all but unlimited. How unerringly right, then, are Christian souls when they turn to Mary for help…”

Pope Leo XIII, Adiutricem, 5 Sept 1895, p.7-8 HERE

“When the supreme hour of the Son came, beside the Cross of Jesus there stood Mary His Mother, not merely occupied in contemplating the cruel spectacle, but rejoicing that her Only Son was offered for the salvation of mankind, and so entirely participating in His Passion, that if it had been possible she would have gladly borne all the torments that her Son bore. And from this community of will and suffering between Christ and Mary she merited to become most worthily the Reparatrix of the lost world and Dispensatrix of all the gifts that Our Savior purchased for us by His Death and by His Blood.”
Pope St. Pius X, Ad diem illum, 2 Feb 1904, p.8 HERE

We pray for the gifts of grace, faith, hope, charity, and final perseverance. The suffering is there so that you can unite it to the Cross to better achieve these other things. This is because our suffering is actually part of the Passion.

To understand this, we again need to talk of time as a construct. Time was created by God; He exists outside of it, as we all will someday. Christ’s sacrifice on the Holy Cross, as the means of our redemption, was accomplished once and with infinite merit. Yet we travel back literally to the foot of the Cross at every Mass during the Roman Canon. Well, in a similar way, the Passion travels forward to our lives, wherein we share in that same Passion, and are called to respond appropriately in order to receive the graces which are also traveling forward.

Saint Paul writes about this concept in several places as our “completion” of the Passion; as “filling up what is lacking/wanting” in the Passion. He also speaks of knowing the “fellowship of His sufferings,” and “bearing about in our body the mortification of Jesus,” and how “the sufferings of Christ abound in us.” So we are called to use the suffering as a tool to obtain the graces flowing forth from the Cross… applied forward in time when we take up OUR cross, our passion, in union with His. The theological term for this process is “Subjective Redemption,” and this is Our Mother’s specialty.

Pray on this the next time you’re in some serious pain, and call on Our Lady to help you through it. Call on her right now. She is watching and waiting, with a motherly gaze.

Have I mentioned that the Daily Rosary will change your life?

“Who now rejoice in my sufferings for you, and fill up those things that are wanting of the sufferings of Christ, in my flesh, for his body, which is the Church” Col 1:24 (Vulgate: Qui nunc gaudeo in passionibus pro vobis, et adimpleo ea quae desunt passionem Christi, in carne mea pro corpore ejus, quod est Ecclesia)

“That I may know him, and the power of his resurrection, and the fellowship of his sufferings, being made conformable to his death, If by any means I may attain to the resurrection which is from the dead.” Phil 3:10-11

“For as the sufferings of Christ abound in us: so also by Christ doth our comfort abound.” 2 Cor 1:5

“In all things we suffer tribulation, but are not distressed; we are straitened, but are not destitute; We suffer persecution, but are not forsaken; we are cast down, but we perish not: Always bearing about in our body the mortification of Jesus, that the life also of Jesus may be made manifest in our bodies.” 2 Cor 4:8-10

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8 thoughts on “Reparatrix and Dispensatrix: Sweet hope in the midst of the bitterness of life”

  1. What a magnificent post Mark….will be saving and visiting this one again often. Good to remember there are beacons still in this present darkness. thanks 🙂

  2. Yes, wonderful post Mark. I’m in awe of the Saints who thoroughly understood and embraced their sufferings to not only follow but imitate our Lord.

    Our Lady of Guadalupe, pray for us that we may be made worthy to suffer for your Son.

  3. This is a really good, important post. The economy of salvation depends upon Mary, Mediatrix of all Graces. We are born of Eve; reborn of Mary. Born in sin; reborn in grace. Follow Mary. Wherever she goes, stay with the Blessed Mother.

    And the idea of time as construct; eternity outside of time the one true thing; that knowledge is crucial to our faith – in understanding the meaning of the Mysteries of Faith and the Sacraments. The Holy Sacrifice Of The Mass brings all of us throughout time to the foot of the Cross in time and in into eternity – glorious, unchanging victory over sin and death; His glory forever and our salvation.

    1. I am really tempted right now to start a painting of Our Lady standing on a snake with Bergoglio’s face.

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