Totus Tuus: Mary, Mother of Mercy

As we prepare for the feast of Saint John Paul II, we invite you to continue on this pilgrimage through our permanent exhibit, A Gift of Love: The Life of Saint John Paul II. We hope you will walk through each of the nine galleries with us, so that you can get a taste of the spiritual and informational journey that awaits you here at the Saint John Paul II National Shrine.

This week we will explore the fifth gallery, Totus Tuus: Mary, Mother of Mercy. St. John Paul II had a strong devotion to Mary throughout his life, and he believed that devotion to her, the first disciple, leads us to Christ. His pontificate was dedicated to her in many ways—his motto being “Totus Tuus,” or “I am completely yours” and with an “M” beside the cross on his coat of arms.

During a weekly audience on May 13, 1981, when thousands of people were gathered in Saint Peter’s Square to hear St. John Paul II speak, a man shot the late Holy Father, intending to kill him. The shot did not have the deadly effect desired, though, and John Paul II attributed this to the Blessed Mother’s protection. On the day of the assassination attempt, he put his life into Mary’s hands.

Our Lady Of Sorrows, Pray For Us

Mother of Sorrows, Bartolome Esteban Murillo

God the Father, rich in mercy, has given his earthly children an Immaculate Mother: the Mother of Jesus. As we heard in the Gospel, high on the Cross, the supreme seat of love and sacrifice, Jesus speaks to his Mother and to the disciple. To his Mother he said: “Woman, behold, your son!” He then said to the disciple: “Behold, your Mother!” (cf. Jn 19:25-27). Looking at Our Lady of Sorrows, who dominates the apse of this church, we can better understand that Mary's new motherhood in the order of grace is the fruit of the love, which achieved its full growth at the foot of the cross, through her participation in the Son’s redeeming love. In this way Mary acquired a new title on Calvary, which is why she is and can be called the spiritual Mother of her Son’s brothers and sisters.

Jesus entrusts us to Mary as our Mother, and Mary receives us all as her children! This is Christ's testament on the Cross. On the one hand, he entrusts the Church to the care of his own Mother; on the other, he entrusts his Mother to the care of the Church. The scene on Calvary reveals to us the secret of true Marian piety, which is a filial love of surrender and gratitude to Mary, a love of imitation and of consecration to her person.

-St. John Paul II, Argentine National Church of “Our Lady of Sorrows” in Rome, 1998

The Pilgrim's Way: Man, The Way Of The Church

As we prepare for the feast of Saint John Paul II, we invite you to continue on this pilgrimage through our permanent exhibit, A Gift of Love: The Life of Saint John Paul II. We hope you will walk through each of the nine galleries with us, so that you can get a taste of the spiritual and informational journey that awaits you here at the Saint John Paul II National Shrine.

This week we will explore the fourth gallery: Man, the Way of the Church. John Paul II showed the world the Gospel message of faith in Jesus Christ and the sanctity of all human life. Visitors to the Shrine will see that, just as the Church walks with each person on his or her pilgrimage to God, this great saint travelled to the ends of the earth in order to be with his people. 

Visitors are invited to walk the footsteps of this pilgrim Pope, learning more about his early apostolic visits to Mexico, Canada, Africa, and the US. St. John Paul II visited 129 countries on 104 apostolic pilgrimages throughout his papacy, and our “World Travels Interactive” wall display traces these journeys and encounters with people throughout the world. Visitors can learn about each pilgrimage by reading memorable quotes from homilies and addresses, and they can also see artifacts from many of the Holy Father's journeys, including various papal vestments that he wore.

Pilgrims to the Shrine can learn more about St. John Paul II’s “Theology of Love,” which was developed during Wednesday audiences early on in his pontificate. Through these teachings, he invited men and women to live the vocation to love through a complete and sincere gift of self. He particularly focused on married love, and the importance of this self-giving love in building up the family. 

Why We Work

The Stone Breaker, Gustave Courbet, 1849

Today Americans celebrate Labor Day—a federal holiday that pays tribute to the achievements of American workers by giving them an extra day to rest.

Many of us live for these breaks from the normal work schedule. Many of us will have a hard time waking up tomorrow, knowing that there are four more days until the weekend. And many of us can’t stop thinking about the next job we’re working towards or the day we retire.

Even if you love your career, chances are that you’ve thought one of these things before. We are human, and these feelings are natural—especially the desire for rest. But God also made us for work, and He made us to work.

Saint John Paul II explored this idea in his 1981 encyclical, Laborem Exercens. In his introduction, he reminds the faithful that, in being made in the image and likeness of God, we are made to work:

THROUGH WORK man must earn his daily bread and contribute to the continual advance of science and technology and, above all, to elevating unceasingly the cultural and moral level of the society within which he lives in community with those who belong to the same family. And work means any activity by man, whether manual or intellectual, whatever its nature or circumstances; it means any human activity that can and must be recognized as work, in the midst of all the many activities of which man is capable and to which he is predisposed by his very nature, by virtue of humanity itself. Man is made to be in the visible universe an image and likeness of God himself, and he is placed in it in order to subdue the earth. From the beginning therefore he is called to work. Work is one of the characteristics that distinguish man from the rest of creatures, whose activity for sustaining their lives cannot be called work. Only man is capable of work, and only man works, at the same time by work occupying his existence on earth. Thus work bears a particular mark of man and of humanity, the mark of a person operating within a community of persons. And this mark decides its interior characteristics; in a sense it constitutes its very nature.

Work is our mark. It is what we are made to do, and it’s what distinguishes us from all other creatures.

The Woman Who Satiated Jesus's Thirst

St. John Paul II with Mother Teresa (CNS Photo / L'Osservatore Romano)

Contemplation and action, evangelization and human promotion: Mother Teresa proclaimed the Gospel living her life as a total gift to the poor but, at the same time, steeped in prayer.

Whoever wants to be great among you must be your servant (Mk 10: 43). With particular emotion we remember today Mother Teresa, a great servant of the poor, of the Church and of the whole world. Her life is a testimony to the dignity and the privilege of humble service. She had chosen to be not just the least but to be the servant of the least. As a real mother to the poor, she bent down to those suffering various forms of poverty. Her greatness lies in her ability to give without counting the cost, to give “until it hurts.” Her life was a radical living and a bold proclamation of the Gospel.

The cry of Jesus on the Cross, “I thirst” (Jn 19: 28), expressing the depth of God's longing for man, penetrated Mother Teresa's soul and found fertile soil in her heart. Satiating Jesus' thirst for love and for souls in union with Mary, the Mother of Jesus, had become the sole aim of Mother Teresa's existence and the inner force that drew her out of herself and made her “run in haste” across the globe to labor for the salvation and the sanctification of the poorest of the poor.

-Saint John Paul II, Beatification of Mother Teresa, 2003

The Pilgrim's Way: Election To The Papacy

As we prepare for the feast of Saint John Paul II, we invite you to continue on this pilgrimage through our permanent exhibit, A Gift of Love: The Life of Saint John Paul II. We hope you will walk through each of the nine galleries with us, so that you can get a taste of the spiritual and informational journey that awaits you here at the Saint John Paul II National Shrine.

This week we will explore the third gallery, in which pilgrims learn more about John Paul II's election to the papacy.

In this part of the exhibit, visitors are called to ponder St. John Paul II’s words at the beginning of his pontificate. On October 22, 1978, the day we celebrate as his feast, the great saint spoke these words as a part of his inauguration homily:

Brothers and sisters, do not be afraid to welcome Christ and accept his power. Help the Pope and all those who wish to serve Christ and with Christ's power to serve the human person and the whole of mankind. Do not be afraid. Open wide the doors for Christ. To his saving power open the boundaries of States, economic and political systems, the vast fields of culture, civilization and development. Do not be afraid. Christ knows “what is in man.” He alone knows it.

As the first non-Italian Pope in more that 450 years, St. John Paul II fearlessly led the Church into the third millennium, literally opening wide the Holy Door of Saint Peter’s Basilica for the occasion.

Papal Intentions For September

Pope Francis during his visit to the Philippines earlier this year (CNS photo / Paul Haring)

As the month of September begins, let us remember Pope Francis’s intentions in our prayers.

His universal intention is for the young, that “opportunities for education and employment may increase for all young people.”

The Holy Father also asks us to pray for catechists, that they “may give witness by living in a way consistent with the faith they proclaim.”

So let us join Pope Francis this month, in praying for opportunities for the young and for all catechists.

Saint John Paul II, Pray for Us!