The Holy Face Devotion was revealed to Sister Marie St. Pierre by Our Lord in response to the freethinking notions concurrent with the French Revolution, which left an aftermath of atheistic and blasphemous ideology, now the norm. Many like Voltaire were both Freemasons and freethinkers,[1] and the slogan of the French Revolution, “Liberty, Fraternity, Equality,” was originally Masonic.[2] While the French lodges of Freemasonry were doubtless more extreme than some, its constitution was anti-Church and anti-papacy,[3] as were the freethinkers.
It is ironic that not only are the recent Church scandals ultimately a consequence of this anti-Church movement, taking blasphemy to an unprecedented level as the ideology has infiltrated the Church itself, but also, that they have become in effect a “justification” for that mindset among the unbelieving and lukewarm, as a sort of “evidence” that the hierarchy of the Church is invalid in principle and inevitably corrupt.
The freethinking ideology in which the “autonomy” of reason was substituted for the authority of Church dogma has clearly led to a decline of morals,[4] which at best is a confused notion of objective sin, and at worst, a total disregard of it. The relativism that is a consequence of this ideology is warned about in Isaiah 5:20: “Woe unto them that call evil good and good evil.” Clearly, the revelations are more relevant than ever.
[1] The Catholic Encyclopedia. (New York: McGraw-Hill, 1965), s.v.v. “freethinkers.” Voltaire was enrolled in the Lodge of Nine Sisters in Paris in 1778.
[2] Alex Davidson, “The Masonic Concept of Liberty: Freemasonry and the Enlightenment,” Pietre-Stones Review of Freemasonry. http://www.freemasons-freemasonry.com/Davidson.html [accessed January 17, 2019].
[3] As Early as Pope Clement XII and as recently as Pope Benedict XVI, popes have condemned Freemasonry for this reason and punished membership by Catholics with excommunication.
[4] The Reformation substituted “faith alone” and the “Bible alone” for the authority of the Church and its Tradition. The freethinking ideology of the French Revolution took anti-Church concepts a step further, substituting, in effect, a new faith, the “autonomy” of reason for the authority of Church dogma and Christian society. Having separated morals from faith, the autonomy of reason led to a steady decline in morals.
The Holy Face Devotion is to make reparation for offenses against the first three commandments. These three are central to the practice of the last seven, though most today at best feel that the last seven can stand on their own. Again, this denial of the part that God and the Church play in morality is essentially the problem of relativism in which each person decides for himself his own morality, making of himself a god.
Relativism gives way to socialism, communism, atheism, and satanism; they all deny to varying degrees the Absolute Truth of God, manifested in natural law, which allows us to deduce the universal, God-given values and rights of men. (They have other noteworthy common denominators: Lenin, Marx, Engels, and Trotsky, for example, were all Freemasons.)[1] These systems of thought are grave offenses to the Triune Divinity, and communism, as particularly mentioned in the revelations, is an especial evil to defeat in that it is “the sworn enem[y] of the Church and of…Christ.”[2] We are to “repair” its (and all) offenses against the majesty of God in this Reparation to the Godhead.
[1] Lina, Juri. Under the Sign of the Scorpion: The Rise and Fall of the Soviet Empire. (…. 2002), 72, 98, 136.
[2] Sister Mary St. Peter, Life of Sister Mary St. Peter, ed. M. L’Abbe Janvier (France, 1884), 319. These are Our Lord’s words to Sister Marie St. Pierre. He recommended a specific (additional) means of combating communists: offering the cross and all instruments of His Passion in reparation to the Godhead.
It may be confusing to the reader why a book published in 1884 should be referenced in referring to communism; the Communist Manifesto not published until the year Sister St. Pierre died (1848), the Russian and Chinese Revolutions had not taken place, and there were no countries at that time referred to as communist. France, however, was the center of the “revolutionary and anti-social” spirit that had spread over Europe, “assuming different names at different epochs to suit the caprice of the moment; at one time styling themselves Socialists, then Liberals, and again Nihilists…. Toward the end of the reign of Louis Philip, at the period of … the life and communications of Sr. Mary St. Peter…, they bore the appellation of Communists.” Ibid., 318-19.
Though initiated in France, for France, the Holy Face Devotion was to be an ongoing practice by all devout to save souls and nations throughout the world.[1] The divine communications given to Sister St. Pierre made clear that the practice of reparation for fresh offenses against the first three commandments, having the wounded Holy Face as the sensible sign of reparation,[2] should be an essential element of Christian life,[3] a newly revealed, timely aspect of Christian spirituality meant for the entire body of the Church. Indeed, Pope Leo XIII saw fit to break from tradition by not approving the devotion incrementally, as it would have usually been first only approved for France, its place of origin; instead, he approved the Archconfraternity of the Holy Face immediately for the whole world by papal brief in 1885.
Remarkably, Our Lord gave to man, for this unprecedented time of iniquity,[4] “the sole means of appeasing His Father”[5] and “the greatest source of grace, after the sacraments,”[6] united in the wounded Face of Christ, as the sensible object of adoration in Reparation to the Holy Face. Our Lord has given to man no less than an essential and necessary[7] role to play in reclaiming our Church and times for Christ by aiding in the reorientation of man to God in repairing the affronts to His Majesty, His Sovereignty, His Truth, making this particular devotion, according to Our Lord Himself, essentially the Mother of All Devotions.[8]
The remnant faithful are charged with aiding in the conversion of the masses through this reparatory work, which draws mercy for sinners, for as Our Lady of Fatima reminds us, countless souls are lost, since they have no one to pray for them—no one to make reparation for them. Indeed, the remnant are no less than demanded[9] by God to be the spiritual blossoming in the religious desert surrounding them. And amazingly, in so doing, they share in the noble privilege of consoling the Godhead Himself.[10] This reparatory work, the Holy Face Devotion, in that it is “intimately allied to the great Work of the Redemption,” yet demanded by God as a new work to repair the outrages of modern society, is, according to Our Lord Himself, “the most beautiful work that has yet appeared on the face of the earth”![11]
[1] Sister Mary St. Peter, Life of Sister Mary St. Peter, ed. M. L’Abbe Janvier (France, 1884), 172. Sister St. Pierre mentions prayers (of the devotion) which Our Lord wished to have propagated “over the whole world.” Emmanuel, M. Life of Sister Marie De St. Pierre of the Holy Family, Carmelite of Tours, 1816-1848: A Forerunner of St. Therese of Lisieux (London: Burn Oates and Washbourne, 1938), 147. Sister St. Pierre refers to the Work (the Holy Face Devotion) which is to “disarm the Justice of God and to save France and the world.” Ibid., 184. Writing only in 1938, the author references “a new era [after that of Sister St. Pierre’s time] of blasphemy and hatred of God, seemingly unequaled in any preceding age, call[s] for a new era of Reparation and love.”
[2] Sister Mary St. Peter, Life of Sister Mary St. Peter, ed. M. L’Abbe Janvier (France, 1884), 290. Our Lord to Sister St. Pierre: “If you knew how efficacious, how full of virtue is my [D]ivine Face! I have taken upon my head the sins of mankind, that my members may be spared. … Offer my Face to my Father, for it is the sole means of appeasing him. … I desire [the] Work of Reparation [to the Holy Face]. My emphasis.
[3] Emmanuel, M. Life of Sister Marie De St. Pierre of the Holy Family, Carmelite of Tours, 1816-1848: A Forerunner of St. Therese of Lisieux ) London: Burn Oates and Washbourne, 1938), 1-2.
[4] Sister Mary St. Peter, Life of Sister Mary St. Peter, ed. M. L’Abbe Janvier (France, 1884), 159.
[5] Ibid, 161. The outrages for which reparation is needed are against God the Father (versus the humanity of God the Son). Ibid., 245. The wounded Face of Our Lord is the Face of the Church. Ibid., 256. “We have in this precious gift and infallible means of appeasing the wrath of God the Father.” Ibid., 258.Ibid. “He made me understand that this reparatory work embraced not only reparation for blasphemy properly so called, but for all manner of invectives uttered against the Church; however, it is specially applied to blasphemy against the Name of God.” Ibid., 290.“[The Reparatory Work] is the sole means of appeasing [God the Father].” Ibid., 290.
[6] Ibid., 247.
[7] Ibid., 269, 301. Ibid., 312. “The Reparation is intimately allied to the great Work of the Redemption and is in reality the most noble and the most necessary work of our times.”
[8] Ibid. Ibid., 198. “Then [H]e made me understand the excellence of this Work of Reparation; how far it surpassed all others, and how pleasing it was to God, to the angels, the saints and to our holy mother the Church.” Ibid., 329. “He gave me wonderful light on the sublimity of this Association and the preference with which [H]e esteems it more than all others established in the Church, because of its object, to make reparation for all the outrages offered against the Divinity….”
[9] Ibid., 293, 312.
[10] Ibid., 329.
[11] Ibid., 311-12.
(More to come.)
Copyright secured by Digiprove © 2020