St Gertrude the Great - the extraordinary German mystic who lived in the 1200s - had quite a lot of trouble celebrating the Feast of the Assumption. Gertrude usually had robust health, but when the Feast of the Blessed Virgin Mary being assumed body and soul into Heaven came around, Gertrude was often so sick that she could barely pray. Gertrude's will was to honor Our Lady, but the weakness in her body served to humble her. She was convinced of own body's decrepitude when she was often in her cot in the Benedictine convent when her fellow nuns enjoyed the Feast of the Assumption. The reality of the Assumption means that Our Lady's body was taken into Heaven because she was so totally free from sin that she was spared the grave and her body did not suffer the decay of death where worms mercilessly boor into the flesh. Gertrude was made to feel her body's fallibility on the day when Our Lady was taken body and soul into Heaven where she instantly became a glorified member of Heaven.
Gertrude was also frail and weak of soul. On a certain Feast of the Assumption Our Lord Jesus made Gertrude aware of her lack of devotion to the Blessed Virgin Mary. Instead of spurning this mystical knowledge because it informed her that she was mean in her affection for the Virgin Mary, Gertrude strove to make up her love for Christ's Mother. Gertrude came to know that her faults in loving the Blessed Virgin meant that how she honored Christ fell short, because it was only the Virgin that merited to bear Jesus and to fail to honor His mother's extreme specialness was also to regard Him as less than worthy of a Blessed Mother with the most extraordinary privileges.
After Gertrude had passed a few Feasts of the Assumption that had been humiliating for her and which had corroded her spiritual narcissism, she was fully apprised that her merits were very much less than the Virgin Mary's. Funnily enough, Gertrude was older but in good health on this day, and she was preparing to make a worthy Communion. She was mature enough to make the following prayer request automatically, without comparing her worthiness to the Blessed Mother. Gertrude wanted to make the most worthy Communion possible and she asked the Blessed Virgin to offer the merits that she and she alone possesses because Gertrude did not have those same merits to offer for the intention that she receive Our Lord in the Eucharist as worthily as possible.
The Blessed Virgin was most gracious in response and she appeared to Gertrude and showed herself standing before the Blessed Trinity. She gave Gertrude a celestial vision of her offering her merits - but also of the favors she had received on the day of her Assumption into Heaven - to the Trinity for Gertrude's intention. Then she wrapped Gertrude in a hug and said to her, "Come, elect one, and stand in my place, with all the perfection in virtue which caused the Blessed Trinity to incline toward me, that you may please the Blessed Trinity as far as possible in like manner."
At this moment, Gertrude remembered her unworthiness that she had prayed to rectify and she begged the Virgin Mary, "Alas, O Queen of Glory, how can I merit so great a favor?" The Blessed Virgin answered her confidently, "Prepare yourself for it by three things: first pray to be purified from every stain by the exceeding purity with which I prepared an abode within my virginal womb for my Divine Son; secondly, ask pardon for all your negligences by the profound humility by which I merited to be elevated above all the Saints and the Angels; thirdly, implore an abundant increase of merits through the incomprehensible love which united me to God in such a manner, that I can never be separated from Him."
Gertrude gave herself to praying for the purity with which Our Lady prepared her womb, for the deepest humility that had led to Our Lady being raised over all the Saints and for a huge boost in merits. The Virgin Mary then deigned to let Gertrude be privy to a conversation between her and her Divine Son, wherein Our Lady asked, "My dearest Son, look favorably upon all who have honored my memory." Our Lord replied that He was going to show double favor to those who had honored her, "Behold, My Mother, I return what you gave doubled." As regards Gertrude, Our Lord said, "I take nothing from her of what you desired to bestow on her for My sake." This was the joyful answer to Gertrude's prayer that Our Lady's merits be taken into account to supply for her lack of these same merits, and it was part of the pilgrimage where Gertrude became the only female saint to be hailed as "the Great".
Gertrude became "great" because she allowed her spiritual narcissism to be corroded. Then when she knew that she was lacking, she asked the Blessed Virgin, the creature who is the most perfect human ever created to supply for her defects. In response, Our Lady most generously offered not only her merits, but also the favors that she gained on the day she was assumed into Heaven. When Our Lady asked Our Lord to look favorably on all those who honored her, Our Lord doubled His favor.
You and I may have a false humility in thinking that we could never be as good as Gertrude and ask Our Lady to offer her merits on our behalf. We may not have narcissism in that we think we are too special to ask Our Lady to offer her unique and special merits, rather we might think we are much less special than Gertrude. But Gertrude was given these mystical insights so that those of us who follow her may imitate her practice. If we are either narcissistic or self-effacing, we may still give our will to asking Our Lady to offer her merits on our behalf.
It starts with a simple anti-narcissistic prayer request. We recognize that the Blessed Virgin has merits that we do not have, yet we ask her to offer her merits in the place of the merits that we do not have. An important point to note is that Our Lady cannot give away her merits, they belong to her and her alone. Nor can you or I give away our merits. Rather Our Lady can offer her merits on behalf of us, who are lesser than her, and you and I may do as she instructed Gertrude and we may seek the three things she instructed Gertrude to receive; her purity, her humility and an abundant increase in merits.
Our Lady may answer you and me as she answered Gertrude, she may offer both her merits and the favors she received on her Assumption on our behalf, and if we honor her, we may see Our Lord's favor towards us double.
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The first classic painting used in this post is by an unknown artist, and the second is Guido Reni's masterpiece The Assumption executed circa 1638.
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