Chapter 12 : Association – eleventh feature of the gratitude we owe 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).
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| Notre Dame des Grâces, Cotignac (Poggi, 2020) |
§ 3. Congregations of the Holy Virgin established in houses of the Society of Jesus
4 This initiative, with Heaven’s help and special guidance from the MOTHER OF GOD, was so successful that in a short while the majority of Jesuit colleges wanted to share the blessings of such a Sodality. Finally, Pope Gregory XIII, outstanding in his support of every kind of good works, deigned to receive these associations under the protection of the Holy See. He gave them the seal of his Apostolic approval and enriched them with a great number of indulgences that he drew from the treasury of Holy Church. He founded the Association of the Roman College, under the title of the Sodality of the Annunciation, in the year 1584 on the 5th of December, the Eve of the Feast of St Nicholas – patron Saint of students. This was to be the mother house for all the others and he gave power to the Society of Jesus to erect similar Sodalities with the same title and additional faculties in all the Jesuit colleges, linking them to the one in Rome. Later, as the fruits of these Sodalities became known and admired everywhere, it was decided no longer to limit them to the Jesuit classroom but to open them up so that membership might be enjoyed by all. To this effect, Pope Sixtus V issued an express Bull on the 5th of January in the year 1586 which granted plenary power to share the treasures of the Sodalities with people other than students and to found Sodalities under the titles of other feasts of the MOTHER OF GOD, according as they saw fit. They were not to be restricted to colleges but could be made available in other Jesuit houses. Pope Clement VIII extended this to Jesuit residences on the 30th of August in the year 1602. By the grace of God, today we can see the fruits of Heaven’s blessings and the approval granted by the Holy See exemplified in the single city of Naples where some fifteen such associations have been established for people of different conditions and backgrounds, numbering more than two thousand members.
5 Philo, that most eloquent of Jewish writers, once described the early Christians in the Church of Alexandria as being like the Essenes. If I had to describe the beautiful works which characterise the Sodalities of the Holy Virgin, which are like the fruits of unknown lands, I would have the material for some great panegyrics. Because we see them every day, however, we take them for granted just as we do the Sun and other miracles of nature; and the fact that we are accustomed to them takes away our sense of wonderment. Some things are nonetheless admirable in themselves, and the communication of a good does not detract from its excellence but in a certain way renders it much greater. This being so, I can see that I would never be able to exhaust the benefits which come back to the Church of God from these associations.
People are improved by them throughout their lives, since they serve to shape childhood, to harness the energies of youth, to perfect manhood, and to give old age a sweet and profitable sustenance. People of every condition find them useful : ecclesiastics learn to honour their ministry; the great of this world learn the meaning of true nobility in virtue; those who administer justice learn how to do so in a holy manner; those involved in commerce learn how to seek their true profit in heaven; artisans learn how to live in a peaceful and Christian way, each according to his trade. The cities where these associations are established benefit in all sorts of ways: the poor receive better care, hospitals and hostels are more charitably served, alms-giving is more effective, girls whose modesty is at risk receive greater protection, prisoners are given more help. No school for Virtue produces daily people more useful for the common good of God’s house. They provide public education in good government within private families, they are like academies teaching how to live a Christian life and they are like nurseries producing those who will choose the Religious life. Where else would it be possible to find a group with more sincere artisans, better members of the bourgeois class, more charitable physicians, more accomplished lawyers, more conscientious magistrates, more faithful counsellors, wiser presidents, more virtuous members of the Nobility, more vigilant Governors, more exemplary Ecclesiastics, more zealous Prelates, more religious Princes – indeed Monarchs more distinguished in every sort of Virtue?
Members of Religious Orders, through being totally sequestered from the world, embrace a holy way of life which of necessity tends towards the highest perfection that can be achieved here on earth. Apart from these, where would we look to find people who have a more pious approach to the Holy Sacraments, who pray in a more pure and holy manner, who examine their conscience with greater diligence, who practise mortification with the least ostentation and who in every other way practise the Christian life with greater diligence? What other associations make it so easy for people to combine their devotion with the management and care of their daily business, to seize opportunities for doing good, to provide help for those times when they fall, to find more examples encouraging them to live virtuously, or support when they are sick or help at the time of death? Where else is it easier for people to work for their salvation, where is there a better source of indulgences available to help people make reparation for their past sins, or where are there people more gentle in their social interactions? Where does the Mother of love cast her gaze more favourably? Where does she shower her heavenly graces and favoursmore abundantly? Where does she find greater and more pleasing expressions of gratitude? Where is she held in higher esteem than amongst those who are continually hearing or reading about her great splendours? Where are the people who will have more trust in her than her dear children who consider her alone, after God, as their refuge and their hope? Where is she loved more tenderly than in these associations where she is known best and where she grants more of her favours? I would make exactly the same points about the other ways that faithful show their gratitude which I have covered in some detail in this work.
6 Speaking personally, I cannot hide the gratitude I feel with all my heart for having received the favour of the Mother of gentleness, and for having spent several years offering little services to her through these holy and praiseworthy practices. It seems to me that my conscience obliges me to make known everywhere how I have seen in various places such beautiful and excellent marks of virtue and how I have regularly encountered people in the most elevated spiritual state whenever I have had dealings with these beautiful associations devoted to our Holy Mother. Along with those who long ago were captivated by seeing the wonders performed by Moses[1], I feel obliged :
• to swear that this is the finger of God and He has intervened with His right hand;
• to say with Moses[2] that here is a land specially favoured by the most beneficent gaze of His sovereign Majesty;
• to say with the Royal Prophet that this is the vine and the chosen possession of his Holy Mother, a vine which has stretched forth its branches and leaves from one sea unto another, and over all the extent of the earth[3];
• to confess with Jacob[4] that this is indeed the House of God and the gate of Heaven;
• to proclaim with the same[5] that these are the camps of the great God of armies; and
• to cry out with the man who was wicked[6] but who was nevertheless led by the spirit of God : How beautiful are thy tabernacles, O Jacob, and thy tents, O Israel!
I have in my mind’s eye an image of the Holy City which the beloved Disciple[7] once saw and where he contemplated so many Kings and citizens flocking from all parts to this blessed place, each with a train of glory and royal magnificence. That which I perceive here below causes my spirit to soar to the heights and I am in no doubt as to how beautiful the celestial Sion will be, containing such a multitude of beauties!
God of Heaven (I sometimes say to myself), what riches will come from such a great accumulation of riches? What greatness will be born from so many examples of individual greatness – not to mention the beauty, the riches and the greatness of the Prince of glory – which would be capable of eclipsing and obscuring all those of the world if His goodness did not take infinite delight in giving them splendour rather than diminishing their brightness?
Footnotes
[1] Exod. viii. 19.
[2] Deut. xi.
[3] Ps. LXXIX. 9-12.
[4] Gen. xxviii. 17.
[5] Ps. XXXII 2.
[6] Num. xxiv. 5.
[7] Apoc, xxi-xxii.
[End of Chapter 12]
© Peter Bloor 2026
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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.
The Virgin of Tenderness. >12th century.
Totus tuus ego sum
Et omnia mea tua sunt;
Tecum semper tutus sum:
Ad Jesum per Mariam.
He that hearkeneth to me, shall not be confounded: and they that work by me, shall not sin. They that explain me shall have life everlasting. Ecclesiasticus (Sirach) xxiv. 30-31.
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