The Crown of Excellence : Chapter 12 : § 7.31-32

Chapter 12 : The Eleventh Star or Splendour of the Crown of Excellence of the Mother of God

Continuing our translation of the 1845 reprint of Fr François Poiré's Triple Crown of the Mother of God (1643 French edition).

Notre Dame des Grâces, Cotignac.(Poggi, 2020)

She has been and is still recognized and called blessed by all generations in the world

§ 7. How she was recognised and honoured in the Regular Orders

The Order of the Annunciation (continued)

 31   Not withstanding all these trials and tribulations, Blessed Jeanne soon realised that God, who can suck honey out of the rock and oil out of the hardest stone[1], had in fact arranged everything in her best interests and this setback she had suffered would enable her to move forwards to reach the journey’s end she had so long desired.

When she was brought news of the judgement that had been pronounced in favour of the King, she replied:

"Praise be to God, for I know that He has allowed this to happen so that I will have a means of serving Him with greater fidelity than before and that I will now be able to accomplish my foremost desire – founding an Order in honour of the Virgin Mary."

     She would indeed prove that what she had spoken would prove to be a true prophecy that she had spoken. Concerning the first matter, as soon as she arrived in Bourges (which was to be the place of her retreat), she decided that since she was changing her residence and her state of life, she would at the same time change her way of life. She set about doing this straight away: 

    • taking a habit with fitting her state 

    • wearing a rough cilice[2] which she would never take off

    • wearing on her chest a piece of wood in the form of a cross which contained five small silver nails that pricked her flesh continually 

    • girding her waist with an iron chain 

    • administering the discipline to herself every evening until blood was drawn and 

    • filling her daily life with other austere practices she adopted. 

     As for her second objective, she never let a moment of time go to waste that she could use to organise or progress her new religious Order.

     On that subject, I remember reading that whilst she was once in the midst of her devotions, seeking earnestly the help of the most sacred Virgin, so that she might learn through her what this new Order was to be and what she needed to do, a voice rang in her ears, telling her:

“My daughter, thou art to include in the Rule everything written concerning me in the Gospels and then seek approval of the Rule by the Holy See. This is truly the means by which thou and those who embrace this Rule will be pleasing to my Son and to me, and will be cherished by both of us.

     Jeanne revealed this to her Confessor, Father Gabriel Maria of the Order of Observant Franciscans, and he immediately gave his approval for her to work on this plan, declaring that the Foundation should take the name of the Order of the Annunciation. He was moved to say this by the exceptional devotion that the blessed Jeanne and he himself both had towards this adorable mystery. He was also of the opinion, moreover, that those entering the Order should adopt the glorious Virgin as their model for she was outstanding in every one of the virtues. For this reason, he also named the new foundation the Order of the Virgin Mary’s Ten Virtues, having chosen from the entire gospel ten virtues or principal qualities of the Queen of Angels which she offered for the imitation of those women called to join the Order. He also referred to it as the Order of the Ten Ways of Pleasing the Most Sacred Virgin, for she had told blessed Jeanne that she and her oblates could not please her any more than by seeking to imitate her virtues.

Footnotes

[1] Deut. xxxii. 13.

[2] cilice: a rough garment made of hair-cloth, generally worn as a penitential robe. Greek Κιλίκιον, a coarse cloth originally made of Cilician goat's hair

 32   Inasmuch as I feel duty-bound to speak more fully of these ten virtues which form a fundamental aspect of the Order of the Annunciation, the devout reader will note, if he pleases, that the first of these ten virtues is that of chastity, by reason of which the Princess of earth and of Heaven is with good reason called the Queen of Virgins and the Standard-bearer of virginity. She was the first who embraced this virtue as her state of life and under the seal of a vow, as the Holy Fathers gathered from the Gospels. The second virtue is prudence which showed in all the actions of the MOTHER OF GOD and especially in the responses she made to the Angel Gabriel, as well as in every aspect of her interaction with him during their divine colloquy. The third virtue is humility, of which she has given more than sufficient proof – not only in that she was troubled by the praises of the heavenly messenger and by the news which he brought her, but also in the status of handmaid which she chose in place of the high titles with which he honoured her on his arrival. The fourth virtue is the faith through which, according to the prophetic witness of Saint Elizabeth, she firmly believed without any hesitation all she had heard from the Angel and to which she gave her consent, accepting that all would be accomplished in her notwithstanding all the difficulties which presented themselves to her mind. The fifth virtue is the devotion which she displayed throughout the course of her life, especially in her assiduous prayers, in her mysterious canticle, and in the extraordinary diligence she showed when pondering in her heart all the wonders she saw or heard during the birth and the life of her beloved Son. The sixth virtue is her constant and loving obedience to the law of God, to blessed Saint Joseph her spouse and to the commandments of Heaven, even those which she did not understand. The seventh virtue is the poverty which she practised unceasingly, disdaining superfluous things, even in the midst of shortages of the necessary things in life; it could be seen in the food she ate, in the clothes she wore, during her pregnancy and when giving birth, in her home and household, in her own person and in that of her Son, the Monarch of Heaven. The eighth virtue is the patience which shone forth amidst the persecutions she suffered at the hands of Herod and the Jews, in the journeys that she made, in the loss of her dear Child, in the cruel death He endured, and on the many occasions she felt she that she had been plunged into an interior abandonment, as well as in a thousand other different ways. The ninth virtue is her charity which had for its first and principal object God Himself and the Word Incarnate, and for its second her neighbour whom she served and helped with her assistance, her advice, her sweet and loving words – in short, in every possible way that was open to her. The tenth virtue was her compassion or tenderness which showed in the works and in the trials and extreme tribulations that her sweet Son endured and which pierced the heart of the Mother in proportion as they were inflicted upon the body and mind of the Son. 

Readers curious to learn how these ten virtues were to be practised and imitated by the Religious of the Order of the Annunciation should study their Rule which was first approved by Alexander VI on the 14th of February in the year 1501, and later by Leo X on the 25th of July in the year 1517. The Rule may be found at the end of the Life of the Blessed Jeanne, which was compiled recently by Father Louis Dony-Dattichy, a Religious of the Order of Minims.

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The Vladimirskaya Icon. >12th century.

SUB tuum præsidium confugimus, Sancta Dei Genitrix. Nostras deprecationes ne despicias in necessitatibus, sed a periculis cunctis libera nos semper, Virgo gloriosa et benedicta. Amen.

 

 

Totus tuus ego sum

Et omnia mea tua sunt;

Tecum semper tutus sum:

Ad Jesum per Mariam. 

© Peter Bloor 2025