![[banner-ocd-tcj.png]] # Why I Love You, o Mary by St. Thérèse JMJT May 1897 (Air: Why did you deliver me the other day, oh my Mother) ## Stanza 1 - I Could Not Believe I Am Your Child 1. Oh! I would like to sing, Mary, why I love you Why does your name so sweet make my heart leap And why the thought of your supreme greatness Could not inspire fear in my soul. If I contemplated you in your sublime glory And surpassing the brilliance of all the blessed That I’m your child I couldn’t believe O Mary, in front of you, I would lower my eyes!... ## Stanza 2 - Mortal and Suffering Like Me 2. It is necessary for a child to cherish his mother May she cry with him, share his pains O my dear Mother, on the foreign shore To attract me to you, how many tears you shed!.... ==By meditating your life in the Holy Gospel== ==I dare to look at you and approach you;== Believing me your child is not difficult for me For I see you **mortal** and **suffering** like me... ## Stanza 3 - Annunciation 3. When an angel from Heaven offers you to be the Mother Of the God who shall reign for all eternity I see you prefer, O Mary, what a mystery! The ineffable treasure of virginity. I understand that your soul, O Immaculate Virgin Is dearer to the Lord than the divine abode I understand that your soul, Humble and Sweet Valley Can contain Jesus, the Ocean of Love!... ## Stanza 4 - Her Humility Draws the Incarnation 4. Oh! I love you, Mary, saying you are the servant Of the God whom you ravish by your **humility**. This hidden virtue makes you all-powerful. It draws the Holy Trinity into your heart. So the Spirit of Love overshadowing you The Son equal to the Father in you became incarnate.... Of his sinning brethren great will be the number Since we must call him: Jesus, your firstborn!... ## Stanza 5 - the Mother's Treasure Belongs to the Child - Eucharist 5. O beloved Mother, despite my smallness **Like you I have in me** the Almighty But I do not tremble when I see my weakness: **The mother’s treasure belongs to the child** And I am your child, oh my dear Mother, Your virtues, your love, are they not mine? Also when in my heart descends the white Host Jesus, your Sweet Lamb, believes that he rests in you!... ## Stanza 6 - Possible to Follow by Staying Small, the Visitation 6. You make me feel it, **it’s not impossible** To follow in your footsteps, O Queen of the elect, The narrow way to Heaven, you made it visible By always practicing the **humblest** **virtues**. With you, Mary, I like to stay **small**, Of the grandeurs of here below I see the vanity, With Saint Elisabeth, receiving your visit, I am learning to practice ardent charity. ## Stanza 7 - Magnificat 7. There I listen delighted, Sweet Queen of Angels To the sacred song that springs from your heart. You teach me to sing divine praises To glory in Jesus my Saviour. Your words of love are mystical roses, Which must embalm the centuries to come. In you the Almighty has done great things, I want to meditate on them, in order to bless him. ## Stanza 8 - Eloquent Silence, Awaits for Help Only from Heaven 8. When the good Saint Joseph knew not the miracle That you wished to hide in your humility, You let him cry near the Tabernacle Which veils the divine beauty of the Saviour!... Oh! that I love, Mary, your **eloquent silence**, For me it’s a soft and melodious concert That tells me of the greatness and omnipotence Of a soul that **awaits help only from the Heavens**. ## Stanza 9 - the Nativity 9. Later in Bethlehem, O Joseph and Mary! I see you shunned by all the locals No one wants to receive in his hotel Poor foreigners, the place is for the big ones..... The place is for the big ones - and it’s in a stable That the Queen of Heaven must give birth to a God. O my dear Mother, how lovable I find you How great I find you in such a poor place!.... ## Stanza 10 — The Adoration of the Magi 10. When I see the Lord wrapped in swaddling clothes When from the Divine Word I hear the faint cry O my dear Mother, I no longer envy the angels For their Mighty Lord is my beloved Brother!... How I love you, Mary, you who on our shores Have made this Divine Flower bloom!........ How I love you listening to the shepherds and the Magi And **guarding with care all things in your heart**!... ## Stanza 11 — The Presentation 11. I love you mingling with the other women Who towards the holy temple directed their steps, I love you presenting the Savior of our souls To the blessed Old Man who presses him in his arms, At first smiling I listen to his song, But soon his accents make me shed tears. Gazing prophetically into the future Simeon offers you a **sword of sorrows**. ## Stanza 12 - Flight to Egypt 12. O Queen of martyrs, until the evening of your life This painful sword will pierce your heart, Already you have to leave the soil of your homeland To avoid a king’s jealous fury. Jesus sleeps in peace under the folds of your veil Joseph comes to ask you to leave at once And your obedience is immediately revealed **You leave without any delay and without reasoning.** ## Stanza 13 - Exile. The Child Lost 13. In the land of Egypt, it seems to me, O Mary Your heart remains **joyful in poverty**, For is not **Jesus the most beautiful Homeland**, What does exile matter to you, you own the Heavens?... But in Jerusalem, a bitter sadness Like a vast ocean comes to flood your heart Jesus, for three days, hides from your tenderness, So that is **true exile** in all its rigour!... ## Stanza 14 - Finding in the Temple 14. Finally you see him and joy transports you, You say to the beautiful Child who charms the doctors: “O my Son, why do you act like this?” “Here are your father and I who were looking for you in tears.” And the Child God answers (oh what a deep mystery!) To the dear Mother who stretches out her arms towards him: “Why were you looking for me?... For the works of my Father “I have to work; don’t you know that?” ## Stanza 15 - Mary, Example of the Soul in the Night of Faith 15. The Gospel teaches me that growing in wisdom To Joseph, to Mary, Jesus remains submissive And my heart reveals to me with what tenderness He always obeys his dear parents. Now I understand the mystery of the temple, The hidden words of my Lovable King. Mother, your sweet Child wants you to be the example Of the soul that seeks Him in the night of faith. ## Stanza 16 - Accepting Suffering 16. Since the King of Heaven wanted his Mother Plunged into the night, into the anguish of the heart; Mary, is it therefore good to suffer on earth? Yes, to suffer while loving, it is the purest happiness!... Everything He gave me Jesus can take it back Tell him never to bother with me... He may well be hiding, I agree to wait for him Until the day without sunset when my faith will be extinguished.... ## Stanza 17 — The Common Way 17. I know that in Nazareth, Mother full of graces **You live very poor, wanting nothing more** **No raptures, miracles or ecstasies** Embellish your life, O Queen of the Chosen!.... The number of little ones is great on earth They can raise their eyes to you without trembling It is by **the common way,** incomparable Mother That you like to walk to guide them to Heaven. ## Stanza 18 - Contemplating Mary's Life 18. Waiting for Heaven, O my dear Mother, I want to **live** with you, **follow** you every day Mother, **contemplating** you, I immerse myself with delight, Discovering in your heart abysses of love. Your maternal gaze banishes all my fears It teaches me to **cry**, it teaches me to **rejoice**. Instead of despising the pure and holy joys You want to **share** them, you deign to **bless** them. ## Stanza 19 - Cana - Intercession 19. Seeing the concern of the newly-weds of Cana That they can’t hide, because they’re running out of wine, To the Saviour you tell it in your solicitude, Hoping for help from his divine power. Jesus seems at first to push back your prayer “What does it matter,” He replies, “woman, to you and to me?” But deep in his heart, he calls you his Mother, And his first miracle, He works it for you... ## Stanza 20 - Jesus Loves Us Like He Loved His Mother 20. A day that sinners are listening to the teaching Of Him who would like to receive them in Heaven, I find you with them, Mary, on the hill. Someone tells Jesus that you would like to see him, So your Divine Son in front of the whole crowd, Of his love for us shows the immensity He said, “Who is my brother and my sister and my Mother? “If not he who does my will?” ## Stanza 21 - Our Soul Becomes His Family 21. O Immaculate Virgin, the most tender of mothers, Listening to Jesus, you don’t get sad But you rejoice that He makes us understand That **our soul becomes his family here below** Yes, you rejoice that he gives us his life, The infinite treasures of his divinity!... How not to love you, oh my dear Mother Seeing so much **love** and so much **humility**? ## Stanza 22 — The Ascension. Mary Left for Us as Refuge of Sinners 22. You love us, Mary, as Jesus loves us And you consent for us to distance you from Him. To love is to give everything and to give oneself You wanted to prove it by remaining our support. The Savior knew your immense tenderness He knew the secrets of your maternal heart, Refuge of sinners, it is to you that He leaves us When He leaves the Cross to wait for us in Heaven. ## Stanza 23 - Calvary, Standing by the Cross, Like a Priest at the Altar 23. Mary, you appear to me at the top of Calvary **Standing by the cross, like a priest at the altar** Offering to appease the justice of the Father Your beloved Jesus, sweet Emmanuel... A prophet said so, O desolate Mother, “There is no pain like your pain!” O Queen of Martyrs, remaining in exile You lavish on us all the blood of your heart! ## Stanza 24 - John Takes Mary into His Home 24. The house of Saint John becomes your only asylum The son of Zebedee is to replace Jesus..... This is the last detail that the Gospel gives, Of the Queen of Heaven it no longer speaks to me. But his deep silence, oh my dear Mother Does it not reveal that the Eternal Word Wants **Himself to sing the secrets of your life** To charm your children, all the Elect of Heaven? ## Stanza 25 - Forever Mary's Child 25. Soon I will hear this sweet harmony Soon in the beautiful Heaven, I’ll go to see you You who came to smile at me in the morning of my life. Come and smile at me again... Mother... It is the evening now!... I no longer fear the brilliance of your supreme glory With you I suffered and now I want To sing on your lap, Mary, about why I love you And say forever that I am your child!...... Little Therese # Introduction to the Text Therese, already very sick, confides to her sister Celine: ‘I still have something to do before I die. I have always dreamed of writing a song to the Holy Virgin that would express all that I think of her.’ (Apostolic Process, Rome, 268). It is her last **poem, like a will.** Therese signs it with a failing hand, a humble and moving finale to her entire poetic work. In May 1897, she had begun to realize that her writings, including her poetry, would probably be diffused. She considered her thoughts on Mary to be an integral part of the significant work under preparation, perhaps the crowning achievement. Therese will give here the reasons for her filial love for Mary. In gathering together here her thoughts on the Virgin, she is not giving a list of ideas, but the fruit of her meditation and of her personal relationship with the Virgin Mary. The request that Sister Mary of the Sacred Heart makes of her along the same lines therefore anticipates an extremely deep desire of Therese herself. Sister Genevieve was right to note that Therese composed this swan-song ‘by herself, in every sense of the word’. It is in prayer that this long poem should be received. It is a sort of liturgical hymn of 200 alexandrines, composed during the month of May, 1997 (4 months before her death). With regard to the Virgin Mary, the only thing that concerns her is her real life, rather than her life as imagined! She instinctively turns to the Gospels, her only source of inspiration from then on. Her heart-based understanding had been refined in recent months in a thousand ways, but especially in two areas: - the **mystery of suffering**, under the mill-wheel of trial; and - the extent of **the requirements of charity**, resulting in special lights. The whole being wrapped in silence. Her eyes fixed on Mary, Therese made silence the great rampart of her whole contemplative life. It was stronger than ever in the night of faith. In the last stanza, number 25, we can see hope being pointed to in the heart of her great suffering. We see all the themes of her filial love resumed in the single: ‘She is my Mother!’ On 8th July, 1897, on transferring downstairs to the infirmary, Therese finds the Virgin of the Smile there to welcome her. An hour before her death on 30th September, she gazed at her for a long time. # For Community Discussion 1. What is the text saying? Understanding the content and initial meaning of Therese’s text. 2. What does the text say to us today? Discern the present-day relevance (social, ecclesial, spiritual...) of the text. 3. What does the text say to me/us? Consider the personal and community relevance of the text. The purpose of this process is to allow Therese to speak to us herself, to question and encourage us, and to open us up to her clarifying and confirming our own personal and community path. The questions suggested are only indicative, and could perhaps be used in individual meditation and community sharing. # Questions 1. This last poem of Therese (May, 1897) is also one of the longest. It was difficult to select just a few parts. After reading it, and after a time of prayer with the Virgin Mary and Therese, what is the principal tenor of the relationship between Therese and the Virgin Mary? - Like a child to her Mother 2. ‘The mother’s treasure belongs to the child’: is it in this spirit that we experience our relationship with the Virgin Mary? What above all depends on us in our relationship with the Virgin Mary? humility, ponder her real life, imitate her virtues, accept sufferings. 3. How should we live out our trials, our sufferings, our wounds with Mary? What is the principal acceptance that is nourished by our relationship with Mary? she stands with us "like a priest at the altar", trust in God (embracing silence), accepting suffering 4. ‘The Holy Virgin... Ah! What could I tell you? She’s my Mother!!!’ (RP. 8, 5). ‘How could I be afraid of someone that I love so much?’ (CJ, 7.7.1). We could share with each other on the place held by the Virgin Mary at the heart of our daily life.