“There is no grace sent from heaven that does not pass through Mary’s hands. The more sinful we are, the greater her compassion for us.” (St. Bernard)
Today we hear from a saint who clearly had no hesitation in officially considering the Virgin Mary the mediator of all graces. His reasoning follows the path of the Incarnation and applies it to the Mystical Body of Christ. Mary is the Mother of the Son and of His Body!
Likewise, the expression about the Virgin’s compassion toward sinners is significant. Sin is often so repugnant that one is tempted to reject the person who commits it. However, a delicate distinction comes into play here: the distinction between sin and the sinner.
Without this distinction, we could not live. It comes from our Father, who rejects sin but has mercy on the sinner. If this were not so, He would have turned His back on us forever. Yet we know that He sent His own Son to redeem us.
How does our beloved Lady look upon us, showing such great compassion? Surely she does so with the love of a spiritual mother for her child.
She sees how he passes by God’s grace and how sin destroys him, and she knows what awaits the sinner if he does not repent. She clearly sees how a soul flourishes when it lives in grace and how it darkens under the influence of sin. She longs for all those entrusted to her care to reach the Father’s house forever. She knows the suffering, perhaps hidden, that weighs on the sinner. She knows the deception into which he has fallen and the wiles of the “father of lies.”
All this, among many other things, touches the heart of the Virgin Mary—the Daughter of the Father, Mother of the Son, and Spouse of the Holy Spirit.