Young Raymond was a normal young boy, frequently
exasperating his mother. In fact, one
day his mother was so frustrated with his behavior that she yelled at him: “Raymond,
what will ever become of you?”
But young Raymond was also blessed
with a strong and beautiful faith, and when he heard his mother shout this, he
was quite shaken. So in prayer, He
turned to the Blessed Virgin Mary, Mother of God, asking her, “What WILL become
of me?” He kept asking her, in prayer,
in Church, and he wrote what happened next:
The Virgin Mother appeared to me holding in her
hands two crowns, one white and one red.
She looked at me with love and asked me if I would like to have
them. The white meant that I would
remain pure and red that I would be a martyr.
I answered yes, I wanted them.
Then the Virgin looked at me tenderly and disappeared.
Young Raymond grew up, professed vows
as a Franciscan, and dedicated his entire life to one goal, one intention, on
this New Years day you could say he dedicated his life to one resolution: to be a saint. And not just any saint. Raymond wrote that we wished to become a
great saint. Sisters and brothers, as
you and I contemplate the new year begun twelve hours ago, as we contemplate our
own goals for 2016, is there any greater, more important goal than this one – “be
a saint.” That if the Lord calls us home
this year, we will be with Him forever in heaven?
Now Raymond later wrote about what
he found was the easiest path to holiness, the easiest and surest path to
sainthood – staying close to the Blessed Mother of God. Dedicating your life to Jesus Christ through
His blessed Mother, Mary.
Now, why would Mary be the easiest, surest
path to holiness, to sainthood? Four
reasons I can think of, and I’m sure there are more:
First she truly is the Mother of
God, her title which we celebrate today.
The very heart of Christian Faith, the one belief that binds all of us,
Catholics and non-Catholics alike, is that that tiny baby lying in the manger,
whom Mary had just borne, is the eternal God, the only begotten Son of God,
through Whom all things were made.
And Mary was chosen, from before her
birth, to be the spotless and immaculate tabernacle, His blessed Mother through
whom we gained our salvation. Mother of
God. In the Old Testament days, the
Queen took on that title when her Son ascended to the throne. The Queen was not the wife of the King, but
rather the Mother of the King. And she was
whom you went to if you wanted something from the King – she has influence with
her Son. And so it is with Mary. She is Queen Mother to her Son, the eternal
King. We do well to remember this and fly
unto her, to entrust our needs, our resolutions, to her care.
Second, she is the person who most
perfectly aligned her own will with the will of the Father. By her humble “yes” to the angel, she
surrendered herself, for the rest of her days, the rest of her eternity, to
God, and to His plan of salvation. Raymond recognized this in a simple formula –
W+w=S. Big W is God’s will. Little w is my will. Combine those, unite my will to God’s,
if I incline my heart according to His will, that will lead me to sanctity.
Third - She is the Mother of Mercy. She leads us by her intercession, by her
tender, motherly care, to recognize and repent of our sins. She leads us to her Son’s most merciful,
Sacred Heart.
Fourth and most importantly – The Mother
of God is all about her Son. Her entire
life, her every waking moment, is about leading us to her Son. If we only ask, if we entrust ourselves to
her care, she will lead us to Him, to see His face. In the prayer Hail Holy Queen, which we pray
at the close of the rosary, we pray these beautiful words to Mary: “and after
this, our exile, show unto us the blessed fruit of your womb, Jesus.” That sums up what Mary’s all about.
And she shows us Jesus not just in
the afterlife – if we only ask her, she will lead us to greater faith, conform
us more and more in His image, show us His face here on earth in the poor, the
sick, the disabled, the marginalized.
In a word, she will lead us to
holiness, if only we let her, if only we call upon her, if only we entrust
ourselves to her motherly care!
So, back to Raymond – what happened?
Well he got his white crown – the
crown of purity, of holiness, that he desired.
He founded an army devoted to Mary, the Immaculate, the Mother of God. He called it the Militia Immaculata, which he
started in 1917 with six of his fellow seminarians. Its goal was nothing less than to bring the
whole world to God through Christ under the generalship of Mary Immaculate, and
to do so as quickly as possible.
And Raymond got his red crown, too. Despite the urgings of his brother
Franciscans, who pleaded with him to go into hiding, he refused, he kept working
to fulfill his mission. In 1941, after
decades of fruitful apostolic labors in Poland and Japan, Raymond was arrested
by the Nazi Gestapo and sent to the Auschwitz concentration camp.
Perhaps that’s all you ever knew
before about Raymond – what happened at Auschwitz. You see, when he made his vows, young Raymond
took on a different name – he became Brother and then Father Maximilian
Kolbe. And you know the story - it was
at Auschwitz where he eventually volunteered his life in place of another
prisoner, a condemned husband and father, and it was there that he was put to
death by lethal injection, gaining his red crown of martyrdom.
Raymond
is, of course, Saint Maximilian Kolbe.
And now you know the rest of the story.
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