Friday, 16 March 2018

#111 St. Joseph Asks for Our Love ~ Marie-Julie Jahenny Pesters Him for Graces First!



This lively exchange between St. Joseph and Marie-Julie Jahenny shows the importance of perseverance in prayer.



Ecstasy date March 18, 1880.



Marie -Julie: “I am with St. Joseph. He says to me:


St. Joseph: “Dear friends, I come to say a word to your hearts that know how to love the Mother and her Adorable Son. For the father, give him also a small part of love.” (i.e. referring to himself as Our Lord's foster father, he also wishes to be loved by us).


Marie-Julie: “Saint Joseph, we want to, but only on condition you accord us a grace.”


St. Joseph: “I can refuse nothing, I am generous, but I want to be loved.”


Marie-Julie: “If you give to us, it is the best way to be. Great Saint Joseph, we have prayed with all the fervour possible. But if you do not accord us - see, you are in our houses surrounded by flowers and the Blessed Virgin is not (i.e. she is refering to their statues) - if you refuse us the most necessary of graces, be sure that we will put you in penitence, away from our homes.” (i.e., they will remove his statues!)


St. Joseph: “I am well liked here and at all the places of (your) friends.”


Marie-Julie: “It is your business. If you do nothing, you will leave all the houses. It is very generous on our part, but this is our promise. Now do as you like.”


St. Joseph: “I will not leave, I would rather give.”

Marie-Julie: “You are rich: you have the whole of heaven.”

St. Joseph: “Yes, and I was asked by many noble hearts of the Cross, by ministers who, every morning, immolate the Lamb that I carried in my arms.” (i.e. he heard the requests of Marie-Julie's friends, and the priests who said Mass. They were obviously asking for something big, but is not mentioned in the text.)


Marie-Julie: “You must give something in return.”


St. Joseph: “The Beloved Son and the Mother of love are even richer.” (Possible meaning: they are richer than Him being the Son and the Mother, and can grant the great grace that's being asked better than he can?)


Marie-Julie: “Yes, good saint, but you also are rich. You are our grandfather. A grandfather loves his grandchildren, he takes them from the blows when they want to hit them.”

St. Joseph: “I will not refuse anything when the Holy of Holies will give me His treasure.”

 (i.e. reveals his power of intercession is still very great and can obtain graces for us if the Father was so willing to make him the foster father of His Divine Son.)

Marie-Julie: “If you do nothing, Saint Joseph, we will love you, but not as much.” (I.e. if do not obtain the grace we ask for, we won't love you as much!)


St. Joseph: “I promise to assist you in the hour of death, and that you triumph in battle.”

Marie-Julie: “Thank you ... We need something else, you know well.”

St. Joseph: “Tomorrow the Holy Church celebrates my birthday.”

Marie-Julie: “We will pray to you.”

St. Joseph: “My children, make me known more.”

Marie-Julie: “Provided that you give us grace.”

St. Joseph: “I promise to comfort you.”


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Ecstasy date April 1, 1880


Marie-Julie: “I contemplate St. Joseph. He says he will stay a very short time. As long as you like, good Saint.”


St. Joseph: “Yesterday ended my beautiful month. (i.e March was now over)  Thousands of faithful have honoured me and you, too ...”

Marie-Julie: “Saint Joseph, have you been very faithful to what we all asked? This is your month. We have made novenas to ask for our Easters (pâques ?)... and you did nothing.”


(Note: obviously Marie-Julie and the Friends of the Cross were completing a special devotion during Easter and praying for a special request all the month of March, but weren't answered yet.)


St. Joseph: “The 'Easters' are not finished yet.”

Marie-Julie: “No, but I fear that you will forget.”


St. Joseph: “I forget nothing.”


Marie-Julie: “If you do not give them to us, see you are well decorated, you have the crown of the Sacred Heart; well! I will put you out. (i.e she is talking about his statue).  You are sure to get out as soon as Easter is finished. I leave you thus so far. Good Saint, you will leave! And still I will wrap you in a handkerchief so that you do not see the place where you will be or where you will be put. You see how the need I have is extreme. If you do nothing, you will go behind all the saints, your face turned toward the wall. We will not pray to you any more.”


St. Joseph: “I will not be hidden, I want to stay with the children of my Son.”


Marie-Julie: “It is your business, good Saint Joseph. If you want to stay, give me the grace. This is what I have to say.”

St. Joseph: “I do not refuse anything.”

Marie-Julie: “The other saints will remain. I will put one in your place if you do nothing.”

St. Joseph: “I never said I will not give anything.”

Marie-Julie: “But you do not say I will give something.”

St. Joseph: “I have my Son in my arms; for Him you will respect me.”


Marie-Julie: “It is not I who will carry you out, but I would remove the Child Jesus. Believe me, I will not put my treasure (i.e. the child Jesus) in penance. Make up your mind good saint. You do not tell me? You do not seem to me to say 'yes'.”

St. Joseph: “I will not be the cause.” (Possible meaning of St. Joseph here: if their request is not answered, it won't be because he refused it. There will be another reason why it may be refused.)


Marie-Julie: “Do not talk as Saint Joseph! You are our grandfather. A grandfather loves his grandchildren. He carries them with him, saying his rosary, leaning on a stick. Saint Joseph ... all the same!”


St. Joseph: Pray again, do not forget me. I will bring your requests to my Son.”


Marie-Julie: “You do well, good Saint! There is no dishonesty in it, there is only love, the desire to pray.” (i.e. she meant no malice, only love and the desire to pray.)


Enough,” says Our Lord.


Marie-Julie: “Saint Joseph approaches Him. Oh! if I saw him saying what the request is, I would be happy!”


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Observations: These two ecstasies are a source of puzzlement: how could Marie-Julie Jahenny be so rude to St. Joseph, threatening to put another saint's statue in its place, turn his statue to the wall, or take it out if they don't get the request they prayed for?  We have to look at the situation in order to find an explanation:


Marie-Julie may have been putting into practise what Our Lord said, “Unless you become as little children..." and therefore felt confident to pester St. Joseph like a child, and not any child, but a grandchild like she said, that knows an indulgent grandparent will not say 'no' to a favourite of theirs!


However, how could Marie-Julie threaten St. Joseph, saying she would turn his statue to the wall or remove it entirely? Note how she was reminding him he was receiving all the honour they usually give to Our Lord and Our Lady's statues, they were going without their crown and flowers, getting all the honour during his month, and he wasn't granting their request yet! And now was going to be 'punished' for taking their honours and giving nothing back! 

Also, poor St. Joseph's statue has traditionally been 'mistreated' for the sake of getting a request. It started when St. Theresa of Avila buried medals of St. Joseph in the ground she wished to purchase for a convent, and by this, have St. Joseph intercede for her. Over time, this devotional practise has gone to the extreme: it is believed if you want to sell a house and are having trouble finding a buyer, burying a statue of St. Joseph in the garden with the promise you will remove it and treat it better once a buyer is found has become commonplace. Apparently, Marie-Julie was trying a similar extreme tactic to have her great requests answered.

St. Joseph tells her to pray again, at last brings her requests to his Son, showing again how prayer works: depending on the nature of the request, perseverance is required. Recall the Gospel parables where the judge decided to answer the widow's request because she became a nuisance. Also, the man who got up in the middle of the night and gave his neighbour some bread to keep him quiet and not have him wake up the rest of the house. Our Lord used these parables to show sometimes we need to pester Heaven unceasingly to the point of importunity and not give up!


Eventually Our Lord came and put a stop to her wheedling and rescued His foster father! St. Joseph brought her requests to Him, but whether they were answered, it was not included in the text, but can Our Lord ever refuse His foster father if a request is holy and good? No doubt they received a favourable reply.

Also, if you still question Marie-Julie Jahenny on her treatment of St. Joseph, the saints also acted this 'badly'!  Note how St. Padre Pio treated his Guardian Angel on one occasion and see how similar this is to Marie-Julie's banter with St. Joseph.

 
St. Padre Pio wrote the following to his spiritual director on November 5, 1912: "I cannot tell you the way these scoundrels [the demons] beat me. Sometimes I feel I am about to die. On Saturday, it seemed to me that they intended to put an end to me and I did not know what saint to invoke. I turned to my angel and after he had kept me waiting a while, there he was hovering close to me, singing hymns to the divine Majesty in his angelic voice. . . I rebuked him bitterly for having kept me waiting so long when I had not failed to call him to my assistance. To punish him, I did not want to look him in the face; I wanted to get away, to escape from him. But he, poor creature, caught up with me almost in tears and held me until I raised my eyes to his face and found him all upset. Then he said: "I am always close to you, my beloved young man . . ."


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