Quote of the day, 27 April: St. Mary Magdalen de’ Pazzi

“My Jesus, where art Thou?”

St. Mary Magdalen de’ Pazzi

The nuns sometimes insisted on affording relief to her in the excess of her suffering, but she would peacefully answer them:

“Do you not remember that these things must be, and that it is the Divine Will I should pass through these temptations? Let the devils do what they will, I know the Lord will not permit them to do more than my spirit can bear.”

Sometimes smiling at the very torments, she would say to the devil:

“And after thou shalt have tormented me as thou wishest, what shalt thou have obtained? At any rate, Benedicam Dominum in omni tempere, semper laus ejus in ore meo— ‘I will bless the Lord at all times; His praise shall be always in my mouth'” (Ps 34:1).

One day, to reproach them for their impotence, after she had been thrown twice to the ground, she said to the devils:

“You can only do to me what my Spouse permits you to do.” And she said particularly to one devil: “I do not deny thy being strong, horrible beast, and my being, of myself, weak; but the Lord is near me, who is infinitely more powerful than thou.” 

And, addressing them all, she said:

“Do you not perceive, foolish and ignorant, that I am with my Jesus, and you can do me no harm? Do you not perceive, also, that with all your attacks you will make me a more glorious victor?”

The Rev. Fr. Placido Fabrini

Chapter XIII, Seventh Temptation

Note: St. Mary Magdalen of the Incarnate Word de’ Pazzi was beatified on this day, 27 April 1627 by Pope Urban VII.

Fabrini, P. & De’ Pazzi, M.M. 1900, The life of St. Mary Magdalen De-Pazzi: Florentine noble, sacred Carmelite virgin, translated from the Italian by Isoleri A., [publisher not identified] Philadelphia.

Featured image: This detail of a portrait of Saint Mary Magdalen de’ Pazzi by Bernard de Bailliu (Flemish, 1641-1694) and another unidentified artist is an oil paint illumination of an engraving attached to a panel (17th or 18th c.). It is part of the collection in the Museo del Convento de Santa Teresa, Arequipa, Peru. Photo: Franz Grupp / PESSCA 2921B Image credit: Ojeda, A 2005-2023, Project for the Engraved Sources of Spanish Colonial Art (PESSCA), PESSCA, viewed 25 April 2019, https://colonialart.org/.