Continued from The Truth About 
Communion in the Hand – Part  1

Not “Optional” for the Clergy!

              Now we are at the point where Communion in the hand is viewed as a superior way of receiving the Eucharist and the vast majority of our little children are being misinstructed to receive First Communion in the hand. The Faithful are told that it is an optional practice, and if they don̓t like it, they can receive it on the tongue. The tragedy of it all is, if it is optional for the laity, in practice it is not optional for the clergy. Priests are falsely instructed that they must administer Communion in the hand, whether they like it or not, to anyone who requests it, thereby throwing many good priests into an agonizing crisis of conscience.

              After the Second Vatican Council, a very wise Archbishop shrewdly observed that the masterstroke of satan was to sow disobedience to Catholic tradition through obedience.

              It is obvious that no priest can be lawfully forced to administer Communion in the hand, and we must pray that more priests will have the courage to safeguard the reverence due to this Sacrament, and not be trapped into a false obedience that causes them to cooperate in the degradation of Christ in the Eucharist. They must find the courage for opposing this novel practice by remembering that even Pope Paul VI, despite his weaknesses, correctly predicted that Communion in the hand would lead to irreverence and profanation of the Eucharist, and a gradual erosion of correct doctrine —and we have seen this prophecy come to pass. And, if the priest’s opposition to Communion in the hand should be fierce and firm, their opposition to “Extraordinary Ministers” should be even more adamant.

“Extraordinary Ministers”

              In his best-selling book, The Last Roman Catholic?, James W. Demers said “Of those responsible for the lack of beauty in the Church, no one is more culpable than today’s lay ministers. The mindless behavior of this superficially trained laity brings to the sanctuary a pomposity that is both embarrassing and saddening to watch.”

              Lay people giving out Holy Communion during Mass was rightly considered an unthinkable act of sacrilege and irreverence only 30 years ago, and for centuries preceding. But now, lay people administering the Blessed Sacrament is an ordinary sight in the average Novus Ordo parish church, and most Catholics think nothing of it — proving that men can become desensitized to desecration.

              It seems like they came from nowhere. All of a sudden, there they were! And where they were, they were for keeps! But if you think about it, there were some necessary steps that we sat in the pew and watched develop that laid the foundation for this plague of unconsecrated hands com- missioned by pastors to degrade the Eucharist, usurp the duty of those in Holy Orders, undermine the priesthood, and rob the altar of God of its sacred rights.

              Bishop Sheen once wrote that both men and women are slaves to fashion, but with this difference … he said if women are slaves to fashions of clothing, men are slaves to fashions of thought. And the fad and fashion that was the pride and joy of many post-Vatican II Churchmen, in the name of making the Church more “relevant” was the idea of lay-involvement in the liturgy.

              Lay people started reading the Epistle, and the new responsorial psalms. They conducted the tedious “Let us pray to the Lord — Lord hear our prayer” “Prayers of the Faithful”, and even greeted us over the microphone before Mass — wishing us “good morning”, telling us what hymns we’ll be singing and what Eucharistic Prayer Father fancies today.

              The sanctuary became a stage, and a weekly one-man-monologue would no longer do. The bigger the cast, the better, and the gripping drama of the Mass became an amateur show. The priest, a man who had been called by God and who had been specifically trained in the study and dispensing of the sacred mysteries had to step aside, either willingly or reluctantly, to allow unqualified, out-of-place, part-time dabblers to trespass and profane His sacred domain of sanctuary and altar.

              But lay-readers within the New Mass was not the only necessary step. Lay ministers of the Blessed Sacrament would not have been possible without the revolution in rubrics that preceded it: the practice and widespread acceptance of lay-people receiving the Holy Eucharist in their palms. The office of Eucharistic minister is therefore the illegitimate offspring from the union of the New Liturgy’s “lay involvement” and Communion in the hand living together in the modern Church. It is a love-child of the 1960s revolution.

Everybody’s in on the Act!

              You can be sure there were many Catholics willing to become part of this “lay-elite” who distribute Holy Communion, but there were also Catholics whose good Catholic sense was initially opposed to this practice, but who eventually allowed themselves to be talked into it by persuasive clergymen, and the biggest ploy used by modern clergy was to resort to flattery … to approach good Catholic men and women saying “You’re a good parish member, an exemplary Christian, a good father or mother, so we want to bestow upon you the ‘honor’ of being a Eucharistic minister.”

              So what have they done? They’ve taken the distribution of Christ’s body, something so sacred that it belongs to the priest alone and turned it into a childish reward for good behavior: like a merit badge that would be given to a cub-scout for swimming a mile or building a wigwam, or like a star that would be placed on the forehead of a third-grade girl because she’s the only one in class who could correctly spell “Czechoslovakia”.

              It’s been disguised as a reward that the good and humble in the parish accept reluctantly, and then get used to. Or it’s a position that the proud and pompous in the parish lust after, thereby showing themselves incapable of recognizing a false and petty prestige.

“Extraordinary Minister” or “Eucharistic Minister”?

              The terms “lay minister” and “Eucharistic minister” have been used rather loosely up until this point, because this is the terminology often found in parish bulletins. In actuality, there is no such terminology as “Eucharistic minister”, the proper term is “Extraordinary minister”.

              When it comes to the sacraments, “extraordinary minister” is classic terminology. For example, the “ordinary minister” of Confirmation in the Roman Rite is the bishop, and the “extraordinary minister” is the priest, specifically delegated by the bishop in extraordinary circumstances. So, if words mean anything, as Michael Davies pointed out, an extraordinary minister should be an extraordinary sight. Not only should we rarely see one, but there should be many Catholics who go through their entire life without once seeing an extraordinary minister. But today, there’s nothing extraordinary about extraordinary ministers. They are as ordinary and part’n’parcel of the modern Church as missalettes and collection baskets. This is clearly a calculated abuse of classic Catholic terminology used to introduce a novelty into the New Mass that has no foundation in Church History or Catholic practice.

              On January 29, 1973, an Instruction was issued by the Sacred Congregation for Divine Worship that authorized the introduction of Extraordinary Ministers of the Eucharist called Immense Caritatis. This document does not grant some revolutionary indult for any and every parish to permit lay-people to administer Communion, it authorizes the use of extraordinary ministers in “Cases of genuine necessity” which are listed as:

              • When there is no priest, deacon or acolyte.

              • When these are prevented from administering Holy Communion because of another pastoral ministry or because of ill health or advanced age.

              • When the number of the Faithful requesting Holy Communion is such that the celebration of the Mass or the distribution of the Eucharist outside Mass would be unduly prolonged.

              The Instruction stipulates that:

              “Since these faculties are granted only for the spiritual good of the Faithful and for cases of genuine necessity, priests are to remember that they are not thereby excused from the task of distributing the Eucharist to the Faithful who legitimately request it, and especially from taking and giving it to the sick.”

              First of all, it is not an act of disloyalty or disobedience to question the wisdom of the document in the first place, particularly when this permission is a revolution against all the pre-Vatican II rubrics that existed for centuries — rubrics that existed for reasons of reverence, to safeguard against desecration and that were a matter of Catholic common sense. But even taking this document at face value, it is difficult to envisage circumstances that would justify the use of Extraordinary Ministers outside of mission lands. Today’s “Eucharistic Ministers” actually operate in defiance of existing Vatican norms.

The Age of Ambiguity

              The term “taken at face value” was used because, as some astute readers will have already noticed, the document just quoted from was loosely worded. The document had that ambiguity, imprecision and elasticity that has characterized many of the Vatican II and post-Vatican II documents.

              Though there is no hard proof that the loose wording of Immensae Caritatis was done on purpose, there is ample proof that the ambiguity in the Vatican II documents was deliberate. Influential liberal theologians at Vatican II, admitted that placing deliberate ambiguity in the Council documents was a key strategy of the progressives. One said, “We have used ambiguous phrases during the Council and we (the liberal theologians) know how we shall interpret them after.”

              The main ambiguity which probably gave rise to today’s proliferation of Extraordinary Ministers was the justification of their use if Mass would be (what was called) “unduly prolonged”. Now, does this mean 5 minutes or 45 minutes “unduly prolonged”? It depends on who interprets it. And in instructions of this nature, lack of precision gives rise to wide interpretation, and wide interpretation gives rise to the establishment of an abuse under the appearance of fidelity to Church regulations. And once a fad like “Extraordinary Ministers” becomes widespread, and everybody’s doing it simply because everybody’s doing it, then who even pays attention to existing guidelines anyway? It is a pattern we see over and over again in the modern Church: “Let’s violate the law, and in the end we’ll have the violation established as local custom.”

Unsuccessful Papal Intervention

              This unlawful abuse is so well established as local custom that even Pope John Paul II, who made at least a paper attempt to curb the abuse was completely unsuccessful. In his letter Domincae Cenae of February 24, 1980, the Pope restated the Church’s teaching that “to touch the sacred species and to administer them with their own hands is a privilege of the ordained.” But, for whatever reason, this 1980 document contained no threat of penalty to any laymen, priest or bishop who ignored the Pope’s plea. A law without a penalty is not a law, it̓s a suggestion. And this 15-year-old letter of Pope John Paul II has been taken as an unwelcome and unheeded suggestion by the hierarchy and clergy of Western countries.

              On September 21, 1987, a letter was sent from the Cardinal Prefect of the Congregation of the Sacraments through the proper channels to a number of Episcopal Conferences, including our American Bishops, on the subject of Extraordinary Ministers. In summary, the letters (which can be found in Michael Davies’  Privilege of the Ordained) stated that Rome has received many complaints of abuses regarding Extraordinary Ministers. As a result, the Pontifical Commission officially ruled that “when ordinary ministers (bishops, priests) are present at the Eucharist whether celebrating or not, and are in sufficient number and are not prevented from doing so by other ministries, the Extraordinary Ministers of the Eucharist are not allowed to distribute Communion either to themselves or to the Faithful.”

              This ruling too, has been completely ignored, as will be all rulings providing a concession for this abuse is somewhere on the books. We can only pray that our Church leaders will finally come to the realization that when it comes to the Blessed Sacrament, you don̓t reform an abuse, you annihilate it. And in order not to continually play into the manipulating hands of the New Paganism of Modernism, then a complete, formal, unambiguous condemnation of Communion in the hand and Extraordinary Ministers is our leaders’ only true Catholic option.

The Sense of the Sacred

              The Sacraments are the most precious gems the Church possesses, and the Holy Eucharist is the greatest of all the Sacraments. Because in all the other sacraments we receive sacramental grace, but in the Holy Eucharist, we receive Christ Himself. So, since it is obvious that the Blessed Sacrament is the greatest treasure the Church possesses, then It must be treated with all the reverence and homage It deserves. And all those pre-Vatican II barriers that prevented desecration are indispensable to the life of the Church and the holiness of the Faithful.

              How often have we heard even our Church leaders lament that “we have lost the sense of the sacred.” This is one of the most astounding statements a Churchman can utter … as if it were some sort of mystery. Because the sense of the sacred is not lost, we know exactly where it is, and it could be recovered in every single parish church on earth tomorrow. The “sense of the sacred” is found wherever safeguarding the reverence for the Blessed Sacrament is put into practice of paramount importance. But the “sense of the sacred” has not been lost, it has been deliberately thrown away, run out of town on a rail, by the arrogant agents of the New Paganism of Modernism masquerading as Catholic reformers, who have introduced novel practices into the Church that demean the Eucharist, show contempt for tradition and for what our fathers taught us, and have led to a worldwide crisis of Faith of unprecedented proportions.

              But for us, through the grace of God, it is no puzzle. We know exactly where “the sense of the sacred” is found, and we cling to it with a fierce tenacity. It is found in the celebration of the Old Latin Tridentine Mass where profound reverence for the Blessed Sacrament is deeply ingrained into every moment of the Liturgy, and where Communion in the hand and “Eucharistic Ministers” are still looked upon in horror with Catholic eyes, and are clearly recognized as the out-of-place, sacrilegious, non-Catholic practices that they are.

Bibliography

Communion in the Hand and Similar Frauds – Michael Davies
Documents of Vatican II – Abbot Edition
Dominicae Cenae – Pope John Paul II – 2/24/80
The Great Heresies – Hilaire Belloc
Immensae Caritatis – Sacred Congregation for Divine Worship – 1/29/73
The Last Roman Catholic? – James W. Demers
Memoriale Domini – Pope Paul VI – 5/29/69
Pope John̓s Council – Michael Davies
Preaching and Teaching about the Eucharist – Msgr. Joseph M. Champlin
Privilege of the Ordained – Michael Davies
The Rhine Flows into the Tiber – Ralph Wiltgen
Summa Theologica – Saint Thomas Aquinas

Reprinted from the September 1995 edition of

Catholic Family News

By John Vennari

            Dark days were approaching for Mother Mariana and the convent in Quito.

            Mother Maria Taboada, a holy foundress of the order and beloved aunt of Mother Mariana, was coming to the end of her days. She would die in 1593 on October 4, the Feast of Saint Francis of Assisi. Prior to this, Mother Mariana was the recipient of dire prophecies concerning the Order.

            As Mother Taboada’s health was in decline, Mother Mariana was elected prioress. She was twenty-nine years old.

            On the night of her election, Mother Mariana went into ecstasy for five hours, during which she foresaw the death of her aunt, the removal of the Franciscans Friars from the government of the convent, and her own persecution and imprisonment by the non-observant sisters.

            After Mother Taboada’s death, Mother Mariana was seized with grief and trepidation. Grief, because she truly loved her aunt on both the natural and supernatural level; trepidation, for she knew a group of wayward nuns would rebel and  wreak havoc at the convent.

            The rebellion was not long in coming.

            A cadre of wayward sisters chaffed at the strictness of the Franciscan Friars who were governing the convent, and who, along with Mother Mariana, insisted on exact observance of all aspects of the Rule.

            The wayward nuns began a campaign to remove the Franciscans from the convent’s governance, and to place the convent solely under the direction of the bishop. With the Franciscans no longer ‘on site’ to monitor daily life inside the convent, there was opportunity for greater laxity.

            The Franciscans, in response, partially withdrew from governance, which served to embolden the rebellious sisters.

            Mother Mariana, plunged in sorrow, prayed to her deceased aunt Mother Taboada, “I cannot bear any more, my mother, rise up and help me.”

            Mother Mariana had good reason to invoke her aunt. When Mother Taboada died, Mariana received a supernatural communication that her aunt would spend eight days in Purgatory, and here she would suffer only the pain of loss, not the pain of fire. Mother Mariana had prayed that this brief stay in Purgatory be shorter still, and her prayers were heard. During Mass, five days after her death, Mother Mariana saw her aunt’s soul soar to Heaven. Mother Mariana thus had moral assurance of her aunt as an advocate in Paradise.

            When Mother Mariana offered her prayer of consternation to her aunt, Mother Taboada miraculously answered. She related, among other things, “My daughter, for now the separation from the Franciscans is necessary … but the golden time will come when the Franciscans will again govern my convent … there will be a member of my community who will change the spirit of the religious … She will be blind, without light to see the things of God … she will make the community suffer much, complaining to the bishop. She will boast about this, but God’s hour will come… Speak with the foundresses, since they all receive Heavenly visits …”

            Mother Mariana then knelt before the Blessed Sacrament, praying to die rather than endure the upcoming turmoil. A brilliant light then came from the tabernacle and a voice said to her, “For now it is better that the Franciscans separate themselves from the convent, but this will not happened during your time as prioress.”

            The separation would take place in the near future under a weak prioress named Mother Valenzuela, and we will tell this story shortly.

First Mention of “Our Lady of Good Success”

            From the very beginning, the demons were determined to persecute and bring down the Conceptionist convent. One night while Mother Mariana was walking through the cloister, carrying a huge cross, a vision of an immense sea of fire rose up before her. A horrid voice came from the depths of this vision, “We want to bury this accursed convent, but those accursed nuns do not let us, especially this accursed nun.” Two monstrous dogs then appeared on each side of Mother Mariana.

            Frightened, Mariana cried out, “Star of the Sea, Blessed Mary of Good Success, help me.” The salutation “Mary of Good Success” had been a title of Our Lady popular in Spain, but this was the first time there is a direct connection between this title and the Quito convent.

            When Mariana cried out, a bright enormous star appeared. In the center of the star was the name “Mary.”

            The text of the account reads, “From this star emerged a small golden canoe, and an Angel was steering the boat.‘I am the Archangel Gabriel, sent by your Mother, Mary of Good Success to help you.’ The archangel, despite everything, put Mother Mariana and the cross into the boat and went forward. ‘This canoe represents your long life,’ he said.”

            Crossing this sea of fire, they underwent a similar attack they suffered on their ship voyage form Spain.  The Angel then placed her safe on land in her cloister, after which the Archangel Gabriel prayed the Hail Mary. The Angel then instructed, “There are such grandeurs which are contained in the Angelical Salutation [the Hail Mary] that mortal men are unable to comprehend.”

            With these words, the Archangel and the sea of fire vanished and calm returned.

Second Apparition

            This brings us to the second apparition of Our Lady of Good Success, which occurred on February 2, 1594 – five years after the first apparition.

            A beautiful Lady appeared before Mother Mariana. She was holding the Child Jesus in her left arm, and held in her right hand a scepter adorned with precious stones.

            “I am Mary of Good Success, the Queen of Heaven and earth … I hold in my right hand the scepter that you see, since I wish to govern this my convent as Prioress and Mother. The Franciscans are ready to give up the government of this convent, which needs, more than ever, in this hard trial which will last for centuries, my patronage and protection. Satan has begun to try to destroy this work of God by availing himself of my ungrateful daughters, but he will not succeed because I am the Queen of Victories and the Mother of Good Success, under which invocation I wish to perform miracles in every century, for the benefit of this convent of mine and its inhabitants … Your life will be long for the glory of God and of His Mother who speaks with you. My Blessed Son will submit you to all kinds of sufferings, and in order to instill you with the courage that you need, take Him from my arms and receive Him into yours.”

            At this point, the Virgin placed the child into Mariana’s arms, “who held Him close to her heart and lavished Him wish signs of affection.” Mother Mariana would need this supernatural consolation to prepare for the days to come.

The Franciscans Depart, Mother Mariana Persecuted

            The time arrived to elect a new prioress, and Mother Jesus Valenzuela was chosen. Mother Valenzuela was weak in character and gave in to the demands of the non-observant sisters. She quickly arranged the departure of the Franciscans and transferred convent governance to the bishop.

            As a result, writes Father Pereira, “The observance of the Rule began to decay, strict silence disappeared, and lapses occurred in the matter of enclosure. In short, the relaxation of monastic perfection had begun.”

            Mother Mariana asked Mother Valenzuela to rein in the wayward religious. These nuns, however, under the leadership of one who came to be known as La Capitana, wrote the bishop making false accusations against Mother Mariana, including the claim that Mariana was interfering with the governance of the community.

            The bishop responded by sentencing Mariana to the convent prison for three days, a punishment that included the removal of her veil and other humiliations. After her imprisonment, Mariana was the placed in a wretched little room and forbidden all communications with other nuns. 

            The six other Spanish foundresses, along with eight other observant nuns clearly recognized this travesty for what it was, and visited Mother Mariana anyway. The wayward nuns complained to the bishop. He responded with a new document that ordered the fifteen nuns to a month’s imprisonment.

            Other good nuns, scandalized by the injustice, risked the scorn of the rebels and visited the imprisoned nuns. These too were thrown into the convent prison, so that the number of faithful nuns in prison rose to twenty-five.

            We cannot help but see in this a veiled foreshadowing of the Conciliar crisis of Faith in our time, wherein wayward and modernist prelates, who are “non-observant” in the traditional Faith, persecute and effectively “outcast” true Catholics who preserve the Faith of all time.

            While in the convent prison (a description of which will be included in next month’s installment) the Mothers received supernatural consolations and reassurances. Some of these are  as follow:

            Mother Mariana was granted a vision of Golgotha, wherein in Our Lord told her His wounds were due (in part) to the nonobservant sisters. He also complained of the dismissal of the Franciscans, and said that Mother Valenzuela, after death, would remain in Purgatory until Judgment Day.

            Mother Francisca of the Angels saw (in vision) St. Francis of Assisi with bow and arrows going through the cloister and shooting arrows right and left. “One of the arrows hit the heart of a sister who died instantly.” St. Francis revealed that this sister was a principle agitator in the removal of the Franciscans. The next morning the body of the sister was found with a black and blue face. Most of the other sisters did not know the sudden death was a direct punishment from St. Francis.

            The other Foundreses who were cast into prison –  Mother Ana of the Conception, Mother Lucia of the Cross, Mother Magdalena of Saint John, Mother Catalina of the Conception, Mother Maria of the Incarnation ­– were also graced with consoling visions.

            In the meantime, Mother Valenzuela became stricken with remorse at seeing the innocent nuns imprisoned. She wrote a letter to the bishop declaring herself guilty of negligence “for being manipulated by the nonobservant nuns,” and asked that Mother Mariana’s priorship be reinstated.

            The bishop responded by reprimanding Mother Venezuela and ordering the release of all the nuns, but he left Mother Venezuela as prioress.

Second Imprisonment

            Mother Mariana was again elected Prioress in 1598 after the term of Mother Valenzuela expired, despite receiving not a single vote from the wayward nuns. One of these nuns left the celebration of the new prioress and planned to form a parallel community. This nun was struck dead the same night, but Mariana’s troubles were far from over.

            The nonobservant nuns, after a month of Mother Mariana’s priorship, sent a note to the bishop calumniating her. They claimed she conversed with Franciscan friars until late at night, said she seeks to do away with the bishop’s rule, and asked that she be imprisoned.

            The bishop seemed too willing to believe these missives without his own investigation. He immediately suspended Mother Mariana’s priorship and ordered her imprisonment. Over the next few days, the rebel nuns, under various pretexts, imprisoned all the Spanish foundresses.

            This greatly distressed Mother Valenzuela. Though ill, she reprimanded the non-observant nuns and tried to write to the bishop, but the bad nuns assured the note was never sent. Once again, laxity at the convent prevailed.

Third Apparition: January 16, 1599

            We now arrive at the third apparition of Our Lady of Good Success, which took place five years after Our Lady’s second appearance. This vision occurred shortly after midnight on January 16, 1599, while Mother Mariana and the other holy nuns were still in the convent prison.

            The Virgin said, “My very beloved daughter, why are you downcast and heavy of heart? That which you have before your eyes is not an imaginary illusion. I am Mary of Good Success, your Mother in Heaven, to whom you always have recourse with this invocation known in Spain … The tribulation whereby today my Blessed Son tries you is a Heavenly gift with which souls fortify themselves and hold back the Divine wrath, ready to let loose a dreadful punishment upon the ungrateful colony. How many hidden crimes are committed in its cities and towns!

            “Precisely for this reason the convent was founded in this place in which He is offended and unknown … instruct your daughters and instill in those present and in those who will come, the love of their divine vocation and of the place that God and I have chosen as our possession and inheritance  … In every century I will live there, exteriorized in some of my beloved daughters. Here, in the middle of the hustle and bustle of the ungrateful world, God will have some contemplative spouses worthy of His Majesty; those who, in obscurity, in silence, in humiliation and in contempt … will be powerful in appeasing Divine justice and in obtaining great benefits for the Church, country, and souls.

            “Within a short time the country in which you live will cease being a colony and will be a free republic. Then it will be known by the name of Ecuador, and will need heroic souls to sustain it in the midst of so many public and private calamities.

            “God will always find here those souls, as if they were hidden violets … and no powerful monarch in the world will be able, with his treasures, to build new buildings in this place, which is God’s possession … The forces of man against the Lamb of God are vain! I will look after this convent with maternal solicitude … and if it would be necessary to hold up with miracles the walls which protect the cloister, I will hold them up…

            “A truly Catholic president will come in the nineteenth century, a man of character, to whom Our Lord God will give the palm of martyrdom in the plaza where this convent of mine is. He will consecrate the republic to the Divine Heart of my Blessed Son. This consecration will uphold the Catholic religion in subsequent years, which will be tragic for the Church.”

            Comment: It is clear this prophecy was fulfilled in President Garcia Moreno, who solemnly consecrated Ecuador to the Sacred Heart of Jesus on March 25, 1874, the feast of the Annunciation. Ecuador was the first country in the world to do this, and President Moreno was inspired to enact this consecration after learning of Our Lord’s original request to the King of France. A year after the Ecuador consecration, on August 6, 1875, Garcia Moreno was brutally assassinated by agents of the revolution in the Plaza of Quito, which is at the foot of the presidential palace and directly across from the convent of the Immaculate Conception.

Make a Statue

            Our Lady’s words continue, “In those years, in which Masonry, that accursed sect, will take control of the civil government, there will be a cruel persecution of all religious communities and it will also be violently launched against this convent of mine. In the opinion of those ungrateful men, the convent shall be closed, but as God lives and I live … we will place difficulties impossible to vanquish, and the triumph will be ours.

            “For this end it is My Blessed Son’s will that you yourself order a statue of me to be made, just as you see me, and you will place it above the seat of the prioress, so that from there I may govern my convent, by your placing in my right hand the scepter and the keys of the cloister as a sign of ownership and authority.

            “You will have my Divine Child placed in my left arm: firstly, so that mortal men may understand that I am powerful in appeasing Divine justice and in obtaining devotion and pardon for every sinful soul who comes to me with a contrite heart … And secondly, so that in every century, my daughters may understand that I show and give them my Blessed Son and their God as a model of religious perfection…

            “The separation of the Franciscans at this time was by Divine permission … But, after a few centuries have passed, they will return to govern this beloved flock of mine … that prelate, my beloved son, will be happy and rewarded by God here on earth, he who … will ask the vicar of my Blessed Son here on earth, that the Franciscans govern this convent. This day will be when the corruption of moral behavior in the world seems to have reached its peak …

            “Happy, fortunate and much loved by God will be my daughters of that time, who… show their desire of submission to the Franciscans, in their compliance with their Rule , and to that bishop, my beloved son. Their names will be written in the Most Sacred Heart of Jesus …” [Note: this return of the Franciscans has yet to occur.]

            Mother Mariana answered her, “Lovely Lady, your beauty enchants me… But allow me to tell thee that no human being, no matter how knowledgeable in the art of sculpture, could make thy enchanting image in wood, with every detail, the way thou askesth me … I would not know how to explain or even know and give the measurement of thy height.”

            The Virgin answered her, “Let nothing frighten you, my daughter; approach my feet. My servant Francisco, with his wounded hand, will make my statue and the Angelic Spirits will be his skilled workers, and he himself will put his cord on me… Regarding the measurement of my height, you yourself measure it with the Franciscan cord which you wear around your waist…”

            The nun replied, “Lovely Lady, my dear Mother, shall I, who am an earthly creature, dare to touch thy Heavenly forehead, when not even the Angels can do this? …”

            The Virgin answered, “Your humble fear delights me and I see your ardent love for your Mother from Heaven who is speaking with you; bring and put your cord into my right hand, and you, with the other end, touch my feet.”

            Mother Mariana, trembling with reverence, did as the Virgin ordered her. The Virgin gave her the other end of Her cord, which had miraculously stretched to reach Her height, and said to her, “Now you have, my daughter, the measurement of your Mother from Heaven. Give it to my servant, Francisco del Castillo, explaining to him my features and my posture. He will exteriorly make my statue because he has a delicate conscience and scrupulously observes the Commandments of God and of the Church; no one else will be worthy of this grace. You, for your part, help him with your prayers and with your humble suffering.

            “Soon you will leave this prison … Wake up your sisters now out of their sleep, so that … in your company they may offer up the morning recitation of the Little Office which pleases me so much …”

            Our Lady then disappeared. Mother Mariana lit the candles to awake her sleeping sisters. The nuns immediately applied themselves with extraordinary fervor to the recitation of the Little Office of the Blessed Mother.

            Though the nuns were grateful for this extraordinary consolation, the worst confrontations between Mother Mariana and La Capitana were yet to come.

– The material on these accounts comes from The Story of Our Lady of Good Success and Novena, An Abridgment of the book written by Rev. Father Manual Sousa Pereira [Dolores Press, 2013]; and The Admirable Life of Mother Mariana, Vol. I, Father Manual Sousa Pereira, translated by Marian T. Horvat, Ph.D., [Tradition in Action, 1999]. Father Pereira’s original work was written in Spanish in 1790. In all quotations, emphasis added by JV.