May is traditionally the month we honor our Blessed Mother in a special way.
This year we will post excerpts about the insights St. Francis de Sales had regarding the beautiful mystery of the Visitation.
St. Francis once stated that he found in the mystery of the Visitation”a thousand spiritual particularities, which gave him a special light concerning the spirit that he desired to establish in his Institute.”
Some themes of Francis’s theology of the mystery of the Visitation are: first, the salvific (Mary’s active cooperation in Jesus’ redemptive mission that commences while He is in the womb); second, the communal (the Redeemer in the womb is welcomed by the community of faith of His nuclear and extended family that is the first beneficiary of His work of
sanctification); and, third, the exemplary (in this mystery Mary
is the prototype of Salesian spirituality to be imitated by Christians
in all walks of life). These themes are salient in three key
Salesian texts dedicated to this mystery: Francis’s letter June 30,
161 0) to Mother de Chantal as their newly founded institute prepared
to celebrate its patronal feast for the first time, and his sermons
preached on the Feast of the Visitation in 1618 and 1621.
Source:
Mother of Our Savior and Cooperator in Our Salvation: Imitatio Mariae and the Biblical Mystery of the Visitation in St. Francis De Sales
Joseph F. Chorpenning