The message of Paray-le-Monial
The events in Paray-le-Monial took place at the end of the 17th Century. Three great apparitions of Jesus to Saint Margaret Mary focus on the message for the attention of all men, that was delivered therein. They took place between the end of December 1673 and June 1675.
One can identify three great dimensions of this message : a declaration of love (I), a complaint (II), a demand (III).
1 - A declaration of love
It is in the first great apparition that this declaration is the most developed. Jesus expresses himself thus :
My divine Heart is so passionate with love for men, and for you in particular, that no longer being able to contain within itself the flames of its burning charity, it has to spread them through you, so that it is revealed to them in order to enrich them with its precious treasures which I am revealing to you...
And Margaret Mary bears witness :
He revealed to me the marvels of his love and the inexplicable secrets of his Sacred Heart, which He had always kept secret from me, until the time that He opened it to me for the first time, but in a way that was so effective and sensitive, that it left me in no doubt…
Margaret Mary describes the second great apparition thus :
« It was then that He revealed to me the inexplicable marvels of his pure love, and to what extreme He had borne it in order to love men ... »
The most wellknown expression of this love is in the third great apparition. Jesus says :
Here is this Heart which has love man so much that it had spared nothing up to the point of exhaustion, and being consumed in order to bear witness to them of his love...
Let us point out several aspects which can nourish our prayer and gratitude :
- Jesus expresses a « passionate love in our regard. It is not a distant love ; it is a burning, ardent love for each of us. It is a love « which has spared nothing », as the Gospel says : « Jesus had always loved those in the world who were his own, and He loved them till the very end »(Jn 13:1).
- Jesus has an immense thirst to communicate this love of his heart. Here it is not a question of our efforts to attain or deserve the love of God, it is about the Heart of Jesus, « no longer able to contain » all the features of love, which He brings to us to the extent that « He needs to spread them ». The Heart of Jesus is consumed by a thirst : the thirst that his love meets us and sets us alight. We can contemplate it and be moved by this completely irrepressible aspect of the desire of Jesus towards us.
Jesus says in the Gospel : « I came to set the earth on fire, and how I wish it were already kindled. » (Lk 12:49). The fire of his love : « I love you just as the Father loves me. Remain in my love » (Jn 15:9). - Jesus affirms that his love is « for men, and for you in particular ». This « for you » concerns each of us. It is as if Jesus was saying: my Heart cannot rest until what I have done for all « men » takes a personal aspect and takes a « particular » root in your life. In Paray-le-Monial, Jesus tells us of the love that He has for all men, the salvation which He grants for all men, his presence, which He maintains with all men… He wants that to become a personal reality in the lives of each one of us.
- Jesus reveals to Saint Margaret Mary the secrets of his Heart and the marvels of his love, to the exent that she can never doubt. It is a grace which we can ask for here in Paray-le-Monial. It is the grace received by Saint Margaret Mary, it is the grace that thousands of pilgrims have received ere, it is the grace of the Heart of Jesus : to meet the personal love of Jesus for me.
Margaret Mary lives this grace though two most expressive gestures :
- She rests several hours on the breast of Jesus, in the manner of Saint John, the beloved disciple (Jn 13:23). She hears the Heart of Jesus. She hears his love. And she lets herself be taken over.
Jesus takes Margaret Mary’s heart and plunges it in his own, aflame, before returning it to her, incandescent. - We will certainly not live these experiences in the same way, but we can ask for the same graces, which are the ones of this place : to rest on the Heart of Jesus, so that He reveals to us his passionate love, for me in particular ; and to ask that He plunges our hearts in his own heart, in order to set them ablaze with his charity.
2 - He loves and is not loved
From the second great apparition, Jesus expresses the pain that his such great love only receives in return
« ingratitude and indifference… They only have coldness and rejection for all my desires to do them good. » And Jesus adds : « This is a lot more painful to me than all that I suffered in my passion.
This complaint will be voiced in the third great apparition :
In recognition, I only receive from most ingratitude, through their irreverence and sacrilege, and through the coldness and scorn that they have for me in this Sacrament of love. What is all the more painful to me is that these are hearts consecrated to me that act in this way.
Let’s ask for the grace here to become aware of the thirst that Jesus has to be loved ; that the love of each one counts for him ; that each lack of love makes him suffer.
I am thirsty, but with a thirst so ardent to be loved by men in the blessed Sacrament, that this thirst consumes me ; and I find noone who strives according to my desires to quench my thirst by giving something back for my love.
Jesus says that the attitude towards the sacrament of the Eucharist, his « sacrament of love, which makes him suffer the most, from the « consecrated » in a particular vocation, but also by a consecration which is baptism.
3 - Demand
In reality, Jesus makes several demands, which can be summed up in this way : You at least, love me.
This is to return love for love. Saint Margaret Mary bears witness :
I receive from my God excessive graces of his love and I felt touched by the desire of some return and to give him love for love.
To make this substantial, Jesus asks her :
to welcome him, to give him room in her heart, and to show it meaningfully, by carrying on her the image of the Sacred Heart, and by exposing an image where she leaves « this is the intronisation of the Sacred Heart to take communion as often as possible, and in particular on the first Friday of the month.
to live « the holy hour », every Thursday from 11 pm to midnight. It is about keeping him company while He is suffering his agony in the Garden of Olives, in order to let oneself be taken over by his suffering of love and to sympathise, and to obtain with him mercy for sinners.
that a great feast of his Sacred Heart should be established for the whole Church. He asks on this occasion for a communion of reparation, i.e. to receive communion with a particular attention and love, which would be a consolation for all the offenses caused to his Heart in the sacrament of the Eucharist. This feast will be definitively established in 1856.
