Keel006

Mary, the Support of the Church

Introduction

Jean-Claude Colin often spoke of Mary as the support of the Church at the beginning and at the end. This seems to be his way of referring to the inspiration Courveille experienced at Le Puy. Presented here is the dossier of texts gathered by J. Coste, S.M., in Acta Societatis Mariae, vol. 5, pp. 264-271. In several cases a wider context is offered than was needed for Coste’s purposes. These are marked with a (+) in the apparatus. At the end of the dossier is added a text of Fr. Peter Julian Eymard that also speaks of Mary as the support of the Church.

The support of the newborn Church and at the end of time

Text 6

1844. Mayet. Personal remark on Colin’s manner of speaking about the origins of the S.M. [Coste text E = Mayet 5, 391-392 = OM 591, 2]:

Text

Whenever he (Fr. Colin) talked intimately about our origins, he would do so in broken and mysterious words which I have often recorded, for instance: “The first picture of the Society was given under the emblem of a three-branch tree...;” or again: “The blessed Virgin has said: ‘I was the support of the newborn Church; I shall be so at the end of time, etc., etc.’”