Tom & Sue May 30 Melillo..May 30: Venerable  Marie De Jesus of Agreda (The Mystical City of God)

Buenos Dias (again as I will explain)

As I was about to end this trip report I lost the whole thing some how.  I wanted to scream and yet had to laugh.  The Author of the Mystical City of God, and who was commanded by God to write it, had written it twice before the final writing as she was told to burn it by two temporary confessors. She got me!  Read this story below it is worth you  time and get the book, which is proclaimed as the second most important book  after the Bible.

As I stated before, we set the alarm for 6 AM wanting to make the 7 AM mass at Our Lady of the Pillar.  We passed through the town with only a dozen youths hanging around, who were drunk and apparently had partied all night and this one old lady who walked faster than us to get  to the Pillar on time.  That wasn’t going to happen so we got behind her  and managed to keep pace.

Mass was again so very special for us in this most Sacred Shrine to Our Lady. (I hope you read the story).  After mass we lit more candles and headed for breakfast at the hotel.  They had meat and cheese but it is Saturday and we don’t eat meat on Saturdays.  We thought about a doggie bag but gave up the idea.  Wired  from our coffee and some toast we got our bags and went down to the lobby and  I went down to the garage.  This wasn’t any fun since some idiot parked in a no parking area.  All cars are assigned a spot and this was not a  spot.  Some people also trying to leave had a problem negotiating their exit and scratched their car as they finally got up the ramp.

The guy was right behind me and it took almost 15 minutes of back and forth to get clear enough to approach the ramp.  Well, a few scratches on both sides of the car later, I did get out….trying patiently to remember that I had just gone to Mass. (as much as I wanted to YELL at this lazy so-and-so)

We headed to Agreda and I was calmed as we said our morning prayers and Susan then re-read the story of this marvelous woman we were about to  see.  We arrived at the shrine, which is also a convent of cloistered nuns, and our instructions from Sister Patricia was to ring the bell and she would  tend to us.  How good is that!

As we waited for this sweet old lady to finish with another person we decided what we wanted to buy in the case before us.  We then tried to explain to her what we wanted and the man she was waiting on helped her to understand.

After she understood she escorted us to a small room with an opening to another room but had a bar and curtain.  We weren’t sure what  to expect sowe waited and in a few moments the curtain opened and our Angel  of the day appeared, Sister Patricia of the Trinity. She was lovely and  warming and answered all our questions after we all greeted each other thru the bars.

She taught us how to buy things in the gift shop and where to  go to seeVenerable Maria De Jesus. We talked for a while, and knowing they were preparing for a big festival tonight, we reluctantly bid farewell.

The turnstile worked perfectly in the gift shop, as I told Susan the items  and the Sister on the other side delivered them.  She sent the bill and we sent the money and they returned the change.  Great system  I  think some of the stores we go to should adopt.

Into the Chapel we went to venerate this Saintly Woman, who has been denied Sainthood for 350 years because of her book, which was dictated to her by the Blessed Virgin Mary, is not in sync with the overwhelming understanding of the Divine by man.  She was beautiful and encased in glass, and very tiny as most Saintly incorrupt people are except for Saint Pio. (sorry  Pio)  We prayed before her to pray for all of you and you intentions. I  know she heard us!

As usual, we left our prayer intentions…. for us and for all of you.

I have read this book 3 times and I will read it again and  again.  It is the most influential thing that has happened to me  for the understanding of our faith.  I cried on the way there  and cried when I left.

We visited the cemetery after we left next to the Shrine hoping to find the grave site of the family but gave up for it was so big and headed for our overnight about an hour and a half away.  This was Susan’s kind of drive, a few hills and mostly flat as we were allowed 80 MPH.  We arrived to this quaint little village and our hotel  which was bustling with visitors.

After checking we went for a walk thru the town and checked each rest. menu we saw for non-meat items.  We were hungry.  We settled for a restaurant down from our hotel and dined on Sardines (again), Queso (cheese) (again) and then I had Baclava (salted cod) and  Susan had eggs, the size of a vultures, and I didn’t even get a bite before  she devoured it all.  As we dined outside, storms swept into the valley from all sides, and we only got a couple drops before we finished.

A  group of priests and deacons and seminarians came to the restaurant and we conversed and laughed since they all knew how to cook as we told them of our seminarian  cooking classes.

We are back at the room and Susan is finishing yesterday’s story as I finish this one.  Tomorrow we are in Madrid and Prado Nuevo, to meet a Counsuelo and her husband Humberto for lunch at their house.  We have been communicating with her for 3 years and she would bring messages to Florita and the nuns at the nursing home for us. We can’t wait to  meet them.   Later at Prado Nuevo when we go to Mass we  hope to see Padre Besan and Padre Guillermo, who was  a seminarian when we first met him and was just ordained, as well as the Sisters, Priest and elderly at this Shrine to Our Lady that we hold dear to  our hearts.

Ok this is it, it’s 7 PM and we will relax and and read for awhile and lights out.

Adios amigos,

O Mary Immaculate, Virgin so  fair
Mother of Our  Savior, please hear my prayer
Intercede, dearest Mother
to Your Heavenly Son.
Tell Him I am truly sorry for all the wrongs I  have done.
Ask Him to  guide me by the Gifts of The Holy Spirit
in all of my deeds and  way.
So that I may give  Him glory, honour and praise at the end of my days.
Amen.

Love to you all

Susan & Tom

The victory of  Christ over hell
As reported by Mary of Agreda
Venerable Mary of Agreda was born on April 2, 1602, in Agreda,  Spain.
Christened Maria Fernandez Coronel, she took the blue habit and made  her vows as a nun in the Franciscan order, and in 1627 she became abbess of  the Agreda Franciscan monastery until her death on May 24, 1665. The process  to declare her a saint began almost immediately after her death, in 1672, as  she had lived a life of evident holiness in the eyes of her contemporaries.

During her life, she had experienced mystical phenomena including privaterevelations.  The most famous of these writings is the Mystical  City of God: Divine History of the Virgin, Mother of God, which had been  dictated by the Virgin Mary Herself. Even after death, Sister Agreda continues  to defy the rationalists and non-believers: her body, kept in her convent, is  incorrupt. Like asmall number of deceased mystics and Catholic saints, the  nun’s body refuses to naturally decay, even after 339 long  years.

SISTER MARIA JESUS AGREDA

THE BLUE NUN
SOURCE: _The Mysterious  Valley_
(http://shell.amigo.net/~tmv/Special_Inv4.html)

JUST A NUN FROM AGREDA
Another notable character on our journey  is Sister Marie de Jesus Agreda, born April 2, 1602, in Agreda, Spain.  Christened Maria Fernandez Coronel, she donned the blue habit and took her  vows as a nun in the Franciscan order, and in 1627 she became abbess of the  Agreda Franciscan monastery until her death in 1665. The Encyclopedia  Britannica states:

“Her  virtues and holy life were universally acknowledged, but controversy arose  over her mystical writings, her political influence, and her
missionary  activities (my italics). Her best known work is The Mystical City of God (1670), a life of the Virgin Mary ostensibly based on divine revelations granted to Maria. It was placed on the Index Libroum Prohibitorum in 1681, but  the ban was lifted in 1747.”

THE 502 RAPTURES

In 1620,  teenaged Sister Maria of Agreda, began having unnerving visions, or raptures.  Cloistered in the convent, she would meditate for hours,
sometimes all day,  and return and tell her fellow sisters wondrous stories of her “over 500”  spiritual travels to a faraway land, meeting savages and
telling them of the  Word of Christ. She experienced many of these episodes ofrapturous meditation  and bi-location, and word began to spread of the young nun in the convent.  Finally, convinced of the reality of her experiences, she wrote a book in  which she described, in great detail, her missionary work bringing the Word of  Christ to the savages of The New World. In early Fifteenth-Century Spain, this  was not a prudent claim to make during the height of the Holy Inquisition,  which quickly put to death untold thousands found “guilty” of witchcraft and  dealings with demonic forces.

Before long the Inquisition took a pointed  interest in the good Sister of Agreda, and she found herself at the center of  a dangerous, whirling controversy. She insisted to the Father Inquisitor that  she was indeed bi-locating and doing God’s work, but to no avail. A very  public trial ensued with the full brunt of the powerful Church bearing down on  the poor nun from Agreda. During the height of her trial, a newly returned  expedition of conquistadors and friars arrived in Spain with a wondrous  tale.

A PUZZLING SCENARIO

It seems that the Spanish explorers, while in the unexplored region north of Mexico, had encountered numerous Native  American tribes in New Mexico, Arizona and Texas who had already been  converted to Christianity, and somehow knew of “Jesus Christ” the Savior. Even  more fantastic were the Indian’s claims of being visited by a white-skinned  “Blue Lady” who appeared to many, drifting in a blue haze while she preached  the word of the Lord in their native languages. She helped them to build crosses and places of worship,and even handed out rosaries and religious objects.

“From 1620  to approximately 1631 the Spanish nun flew from Spain to the North American  State of New Mexico on more than 500 occasions. Thus it was established in the open case of the Holy Inquisition against the nun in 1635, in which it was  affirmed further that no one in the convent noticed her absence during those  flights. On occasion they would happen twice during the same day. . . How then  can we explain a woman of scarcely eighteen years of age that could bi-locate  to New Mexico, and while there, she would dedicate herself to distribute among  the natives rosaries and other liturgical objects as she instructed them about  the truth of the Christian faith. . . Her trips occurred shortly before the  diocese of Mexico decided to send evangelizers [north] towards those  unexplored territories. Her visits made their
efforts considerably easier.  11”

POSSIBLE EXPLANATION FOR THE CONQUEST OF NEW MEXICO

These first Spanish explorers to the  Southwest were amazed by the Natives knowledge of Christianity and were  baffled by the rosaries they were shown and by their earnest descriptions of  the “Blue Lady” that had come from afar and preached to them.

“Finally,  when the first Franciscans, led by Friar Benvenedes, arrived [at the Isleta  Pueblo] they discovered a singular spectacle. Thousands of
Indians approached  the Franciscans and asked earnestly for baptism. Benvenedes  wrote later of the Spaniard’s efforts to ascertain how the
Indians had  foreknowledge of Christianity:

“‘When  those Indians were asked to tell us what was the reason for which, with so  much affection, they asked for baptism and religious
indoctrination, they  answered that a woman had come and preached to each one of them in
their own  tongue.

The rapid  Spanish conquest and control of New Mexico in the Fifteenth and Sixteenth  Centuries may have partially been due to Sister Agreda’s solo
missionary  efforts on behalf of a bewildered Catholic Church.

“Only in  New Mexico did the Franciscans baptize more than 50,000 people in record time  and rapidly install twenty-five missions and minister to more than ninety  towns. The Indians remembered with special veneration the Blue Lady, the one  whom they gave this name due to her blue mantle of celestial tones she wore on  her back. 14” During the mid-Sixteen-hundreds, the celebrated bi-locating nun  from Agreda garnered national notoriety. King Philip of Spain may have  enlisted her help in foreign affairs, and it is firmly documented that the king carried on a life-long correspondence with her. It is surmised by some  that Sister Agreda may have even bi-located to foreign courts on covert  foreign-policy missions on behalf of Spain. Now one would think that this  story, alone, is compelling, but the unbelievable saga of our talented nun and  her doppleganger-twin does not end there.

INCORRUPTIBLE IN DEATH

Even in death, Sister Agreda defies the  rationalists and supplies non-believers and the faithful with evidence of her  fantastic talents. In a
secluded crypt on the grounds of the convent we find  what proves to be the latestdramatic chapter to her unbelievable story.  Sister Marie Jesus Agreda’s body, it turns out, is incorruptible. Like a small  number of deceased mystics and Catholic saints, the nun’s body refuses to  naturally decay, even after 335 long years. The flush of her cheeks and her  life-like features still baffle the Catholic Church and modern science. During  an opening of her casket in 1909, a cursory scientific examination was  performed on the pristine body in peaceful repose, astounding the scientists  and doctors who were allowed to perform the examination. In 1989 a Spanish  physician named Andreas Medina participated in another examination of Sister  Maria Jesus Agreda as she lay in the convent of the Conceptionist nuns, the  same monastery where she had lived in the 1600s.