What is First Saturday Devotion?

Meditation Set #1:  (Month of July)

Joyful Mysteries [Purity]



1. The Annunciation: “Thou has found grace with God.” Mary’s “angelic purity” - that poetic phrase is a misfortune. It makes Mary a little unapproachable. Purity is not an angelic virtue - it cannot be, since angels have no bodies. It is a human virtue, and Mary’s purity was very human. So human, in fact, that, like all else human, it would not have been perfect without grace. It was grace that kept her soul free from original sin: grace, too, that led her to vow her virginity - the state of purity - to God. Angels are virgin by nature; Mary was virgin; Mary was pure, by grace. I need grace to be pure. The will to be pure is necessary as well, but it is not enough. I must understand that or I shall not be chaste. And I must pray for that grace daily.
2. The Visitation: “How have I deserved that the mother of my Lord should come to me?” Original sin did not change man’s nature, but it did deform it. God had made man as He had made everything else, in an orderly way - mind over matter. Adams’s pride introduced a spirit of private enterprise into man’s lower faculties and passions. It was still mind over matter; that is why we are guilty when we sin. But the flesh was in a constant state of anarchy, and the spirit needed help, Mary brought this help to Elizabeth’s home; it was her Son. The grace I need to be pure - to subject flesh to spirit - I owe to Jesus Christ. It is always Mary who brings it. The more I feel my weakness and ask her aid, the more Mary is ready to help me with her Son’s grace.
3. The Nativity: “She brought forth her firstborn son.” Christmas was the beginning of “one world.” Like His Heavenly Father, Jesus would have a chosen race - all mankind in the Catholic Church. The Church, to all appearances a mere organization, is really an organism - the Mystical Body of Christ, a body living and breathing the life of God by grace. The cells of this body are men, and it is meant to grow to “the fullness of Christ.” That is why Jesus, the Head of the Mystical Body, did not come to earth full-grown out of the clouds, but was born a Child. Purity of mind and body is a personal precept and a social virtue. But it is much more. It is a bulwark of the Kingdom of God on earth.
4. The Presentation in the Temple: “She never left the temple, with fastings and prayers worshipping night and day.” Anna’s life story is startling, but the point of it is practical and commonplace. Mortification is the moral - self-discipline of soul and body. Anna’s coming to live in the Temple as a young woman cut off sinful occasions at a stroke. Fasting kept her body quiet, leaving her free for constant prayer to God. The resulting spotlessness of heart and mind and body enabled her to see the Savior in a Child. “Blessed are the clean of heart, for they shall see God.” My vocation is not Anna’s, but my purity of mind and body ought to be. Shunning unnecessary occasions of sin and moderation in all things - these are purity’s price. Without them, prayer is presumption.
5. The Finding of Jesus in the Temple: “Did you not know that I must be about My Father’s business?” Almost thirty of our Lord’s thirty-three years on earth were passed at out-of-the-way Nazareth in a sort of rural oblivion. Jesus lived an obscure life of which we know nothing, except that He was not idle. His mind was not idle, nor His Heart; they were altogether preoccupied with “His Father’s business.” Only once did He give expression to His intense activity of soul, when, as a boy of twelve, He left Mary and Joseph to instruct the teachers of the Law. It is our one glimpse into a Heart eaten up with zeal for the Father’s house. Idleness is purity’s chief enemy. My best armor against temptations of impurity is to keep out of their range, with a mind and body well-occupied.

Sorrowful Mysteries [Poverty]

1. The Agony: “If I ask, My Father will send Me twelve legions of angels.” Poverty was a favorite theme with Jesus. “Do not lay up treasures on earth,” He said in His first sermon; “and the people heard Him gladly,” because they were poor. He grieved openly over the rich young man, possessed by His possessions. He told the pointed tale of a fool who dreamed of bigger barns on His deathbed. He praised the widow who put her last penny into the Temple treasury. And what He preached, Jesus practiced. The night before He died, He renounced an army of glorious angels, His possession by right, and entered upon His passion (as He had entered the world) in utter poverty. In these meditations dear Lord, help me to understand why You speak of poverty as a blessing.
2. The Scourging: “My Kingdom is not of this world.” Jesus was a poor Man, but He did not despise men of wealth. As a baby He had received gifts of gold from the Magi. He befriended money-changers; one of them became an Apostle. “He looked upon the rich young man and loved him.” He dined with the well-to-do, with Simon the Pharisee, with Zacchaeus. A rich man, Joseph of Arimathea, was to have the privilege of burying Him. Clearly, the sun of His divine love shone upon poor and rich alike. But He did want rich men not to rest in their riches, if they wish to rest in Him. The Kingdom of Christ is “out of this world.” Jesus loved the rich young man in spite of His wealth; the rich young man left Jesus because of His wealth. Sufficient reason to feel concern for the rich, rather than envy them.
3. The Crowning: “They clothed Him in a scarlet cloak.” Jesus lived in poverty, but never in squalor. By force of circumstances, He was born in a dingy cave, but Mary wrapped Him in immaculate swaddling-bands, and laid Him on fresh clean straw. Our Lord’s home at Nazareth was a poor man’s hut; but Mary, a perfect housewife, never let her poverty gather dust. Later on, her Son’s plain, rough robe did not embarrass Him in the presence of fashionable aristocracy. On the other hand, He avoided any affection of elegance. “Don’t fret about your clothing,” He once said. Indeed, the only time He was royally dressed was in His Passion, when the jeering soldiery threw a scarlet cloak about His bleeding Body. The spirit of simplicity avoids two extremes, squalor and luxury. Its hallmark is simplicity. Its exemplar is Christ.
4. The Way of the Cross: “Weep not for Me, but for yourselves.” Jesus was a sorry sight as He dragged Himself along to Calvary. Here was a Man who, within a few hours, had lost everything; friends, reputation, majestic bearing, commanding eloquence. His miraculous might had apparently become a mere memory. He is the divine Poor Man, whose only possession is a Cross. But Jesus will have no sympathy. He accepts His lot, because it is the way His Heavenly Father has willed Him to save the world. He tells a group of mourning women to save their tears for themselves and their children; when Jerusalem is destroyed, many of them will share His fate. Our world is full of poor people on their way to Calvary. They want more than my sympathy. Especially they need my prayers.
5. The Crucifixion: “Joseph laid Jesus’ body in a tomb.” Twice especially Jesus showed His great love of poverty - at His birth and at His death. A royal place would not have been fine enough to welcome His august divinity. Instead, He chose to be born of poor parents outside the town of Bethlehem, in a wretched stable scarcely fit for cattle. When He was dead, and the world was saved and Heaven opened, we might expect angelic splendor to shine about His body. Instead, He was buried as He had been born - outside the city in another man’s cave. Everyone must die poor. We will bring before God only the wealth of our virtue. Am I “rich towards God?”

Glorious Mysteries [Mary and the Church]

1. The Resurrection: “All generations shall call me blessed.” Until your Son’s Resurrection, Mary, your part in the drama of Redemption was played behind a nearly closed curtain. Only a few people knew that God was your Son. During His public life, you crossed the stage only two or three times. You might have made your own the declaration of John the Baptist, “He must increase, I must decrease.” On Calvary, to all appearances, you were only a Mother with a crushed heart watching her condemned Son die. But after the Apostles had seen the risen Lord, they gravitated toward you, His Mother. Mary, House of Gold surrounded by the Pillars of the Church! My part in God’s drama may appear insignificant. But a saint who plays a small part well - as Mary seemed to do - can “save the play.”
2. The Ascension: “Coming in from Olivet, they all gave themselves up to prayer, with Mary the Mother of Jesus.” The ten days between the Lord’s Ascension and Pentecost would have been awkward ones for the Apostles - if you hadn’t been with them, Mary. To be sure, they were not numb with utter disillusionment, as they had been between Good Friday and Easter. On the contrary, they radiated joyous expectancy. Still, they were not yet “clothed with power from on high,” not yet confirmed in grace by the mighty wind and tiny flame of Pentecost, the “sacraments” of the Holy Spirit. They were still very emotional, excitable, impetuous - and they needed your gentle, untroubled, loving presence, Mary. The spirit that leads me is not always God’s. If Apostles needed Mary, how much more do I?
3. Pentecost: “They were all filled with the Holy Spirit.” For the Apostles, the citizenry, the pilgrims to the Holy City “from every country under Heaven,” Pentecost was certainly a remarkable day. Says the author of The Acts of the Apostles: “The crowds were bewildered, beside themselves with astonishment,” as the Apostles began to preach Christ in every known language. The Holy Spirit had given them that marvelous gift among many others. What gifts did He give to you, Mary? Not only to speak many tongues, but to listen to many hearts. You were to be everyone’s Mother, Mary. All Christians were to run to you with their worries and troubles. Simeon had prophesied this of you: “Out of many hearts thoughts shall be revealed.” Do I pour out my heart to Mary - often?
4. The Assumption: “I will not leave you orphans.” “It is expedient for you that I go,” Jesus had said to His downcast Apostles. It was God’s plan that the Holy Spirit, the Spirit of loving zeal and true holiness, should not descend until Jesus had ascended. You, Mary, might have said the same thing to the Apostles as they gathered about you just before your death. “It is expedient for you that I go. Just as my Son is closer to you in Heaven that ever He was on earth, so shall I be. Every grace that Jesus gives will be obtained through my intercession, and bestowed on you at my hands.” Mary is Mediatrix of her Son’s treasury of grace. My daily Rosary is a key to that treasure.
5. The Coronation: “The valiant woman.” On earth, Mary, you were all mother – infinitely tender, understanding, compassionate. In Heaven, while you are our Mother still, you are much more. When the Church sings of you: “Fair art thou, and comely, daughter of Jerusalem,” she adds this thunderous refrain: “- and terrible as an army set for the fray!” The gentle, humble Mother of Jesus, sword in hand! What do you make war upon, Mary? The Church tells me: “Rejoice, Mary Virgin! Thou alone hast destroyed all the world’s heresies!” It is against Satan sin and unbelief that Mary leads the army of God. Mary is meek, but Mary is mighty. Communism is bound in the coils of her Rosary.