Our Lady’s Little Rabble

 

ON THE FEAST OF THE IMMACULATE CONCEPTION
OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY

 

UNTIL now (meaning, for the past fourteen years of this apostolate), I have placed these writings “out there” for anyone to read, which will remain the case. But now, I believe what I am writing, and will write in the days ahead, are intended for a small group of souls. What do I mean? I will let Our Lord speak for himself:

All are invited to join my special fighting force. The coming of my Kingdom must be your only purpose in life. My words will reach a multitude of souls. Trust! I will  help all of you in a miraculous way. Do not love comfort. Do not be cowards. Do not wait. Confront the Storm to save souls. Give yourself to the work. If you do nothing, you abandon the earth to Satan and to sin. Open your eyes and see all the dangers that claim victims and threaten your own souls. —Jesus to Elizabeth Kindelmann, The Flame of Love, pg. 34, published by Children of the Father Foundation; Imprimatur Archbishop Charles Chaput

Jesus is Coming! At the head of this special fighting force preparing the way is Our Lady. The group is small because few respond to her call;^[1]Matt 7:14 the band is paltry because few accept the conditions; the force is tiny because few confront the storm in their own souls much less the Storm spreading over the world. They are often those who reject the “signs of the times”…

…those of us who do not want to see the full force of evil and do not want to enter into his Passion. —POPE BENEDICT XVI, Catholic News Agency, Vatican City, Apr 20, 2011, General Audience

Small is the number of those who understand and follow me… —Our Lady of Medjugorje, message allegedly to Mirjana, May 2nd, 2014

We are truly living as in the days of Noah when many are those caught up in “buying and selling,” seeking the comforts of the world rather than preparing for the Great Storm (that is so close, one can practically smell the nitrogen in its droplets of justice). Strangely, I feel as though this writing will be, for some, the last invitation to join Our Lady’s Little Rabble—those who will lead the charge against the powers of darkness. Thus, this writing is an appeal from one crying out in the wilderness:

Prepare the way of the Lord, make straight his paths! (Yesterday’s Gospel)

It is a cry that, at its very heart, is an appeal to trust: to finally give one’s personal and total fiat to God and hand the reins of one’s soul over to Our Lady in order to follow her lead. For to her and her offspring are given the task of crushing the serpent’s head in order to make way for the reign of Christ (cf. today’s First Reading).

If Jesus is Coming, did you expect less? Did you think that we are mere spectators of the greatest event since the Resurrection?

 

OUR LADY’S LITTLE RABBLE

In the eyes of the world, this “special fighting force” is nothing. We are aliens in a foreign land. We find ourselves surrounded by a world hostile to God and everything He stands for. We are exactly like the Israelites in the days of Gideon.

Surrounded by the armies of Midian, Gideon addressed his 32,000 soldiers as Our Lady once addressed the entire Church at Fatima, and then throughout the decades until this final call at the present hour:

“If anyone is afraid or fearful, let him leave! Let him depart from Mount Gilead!” Twenty-two thousand of the soldiers left, but ten thousand remained. The Lord said to Gideon: “There are still too many soldiers. Lead them down to the water and I will test them for you there. If I tell you that a certain man is to go with you, he must go with you. But no one is to go if I tell you he must not. When Gideon led the soldiers down to the water, the Lord said to him: Everyone who laps up the water as a dog does with its tongue you shall set aside by himself; and everyone who kneels down to drink raising his hand to his mouth you shall set aside by himself. Those who lapped up the water with their tongues numbered three hundred, but all the rest of the soldiers knelt down to drink the water. The Lord said to Gideon: By means of the three hundred who lapped up the water I will save you and deliver Midian into your power.” (Judges 7:3-7)

The 300 are those who, laying down their fears, setting aside political correctness, and humbling themselves with their faces to the ground, have placed themselves at the edge of Living Waters. They let no comfort come between them and the River of Life, not even their own hands (ie. good things that can nonetheless be sacrificed); they are not afraid to suffer, to let themselves get a little “dirty” for the sake of the call. They are those who have laid down their natural weapons—those attachments in which they have placed their security and even faith (money, intelligence, natural giftedness, property, material things, etc.). Moreover, they are those whose faith has been tested in this current papacy but have not turned against the Pope (which is part of the test, as you will see in a moment).

For the battle at hand is ultimately to drive out the powers of darkness in order to help usher in the Kingdom of God.

For, although we are in the flesh, we do not battle according to the flesh, for the weapons of our battle are not of flesh but are enormously powerful, capable of destroying fortresses. (2 Corinthians 7:3-4)

In other words, the Rabble is being called to act completely contrary to their rational inclinations—to walk by faith, not by sight—following exactly in Our Lady’s footsteps as she whispers her instructions:

Gideon divided the three hundred men into three companies, and provided them all with horns and with empty jars and torches inside the jars. “Watch me and follow my lead,” he told them. “I shall go to the edge of the camp, and as I do, you must do also.” (Judges 7:16-17)

These three little groups (composed of a remnant of the clergy, religious and laity) are going to lead a charge that will begin to blind Satan. Within their hearts, they will carry the Flame of Love, which is the Gift of Living in the Divine Will (which I will explain and help you to receive in the days ahead)…

…my Flame of Love… is Jesus Himself. —Our Lady to Elizabeth Kindelmann, August 31, 1962

The purpose of the times we are now living in is to enable certain souls to receive this Gift as individuals in preparation for the time when the entire world will receive it. —Daniel O’Connor, The Crown of Sanctity: On the Revelations of Jesus to Luisa Piccarreta, p. 113 (Kindle Edition)

The horn is the Sword of the Spirit, which is the Word and power of God; the jar symbolizes the quiet, hidden life of humility we are to lead in imitation of Our Lady until the moment comes when the “the Woman clothed with the sun” makes her move in the darkest part of the Storm:

So Gideon and the hundred men who were with him came to the edge of the camp at the beginning of the middle watch, just after the posting of the guards. They blew the horns and broke the jars they were holding. When the three companies had blown their horns and broken their jars, they took the torches in their left hands, and in their right the horns they had been blowing, and cried out, “A sword for the Lord and for Gideon!” (“for Our Lord and Our Lady!” Judges 7:19-20)

With that, Midian’s armies were thrown into confusion and began attacking one another!

It will be the Great Miracle of light blinding Satan… The torrential flood of blessings about to jolt the world must begin with the small number of the most humble souls. —Our Lady to Elizabeth, www.theflameoflove.org

Here, we turn to the dream of St. John Bosco that seems to describe the scene:

At this point, a great convulsion takes place. All the ships that until then had fought against the Pope’s ship are scattered; they flee away, collide and break to pieces one against another. Some sink and try to sink others. Several small ships that had fought gallantly for the Pope race to be the first to bind themselves to those two columns [of the Eucharist and Mary]. Many other ships, having retreated through fear of the battle, cautiously watch from far away; the wrecks of the broken ships having been scattered in the whirlpools of the sea, they in their turn sail in good earnest to those two columns, and having reached them, they make themselves fast to the hooks hanging down from them and their they remain safe, together with the principal ship, on which is the Pope. Over the sea their reigns a great calm. —St. John Bosco, cf. miraclerosarymission.org 

Yes, those who have been attacking the Pope—both those inside and outside the Church—are humbled and their vessels of pride utterly shipwrecked. Our Lady’s Little Rabble secure themselves firmly to the pillars of Our Lord and Our Lady. Those others who, while not rejecting the faith, nonetheless, sat on the fence out of fear and apprehension, join the Rabble, though carrying within them a deep sorrow and contrition for having not trusted completely in the Lord. Suddenly, there is a “great calm”—a moment of reprieve in the Eye of the Storm in which souls will be marked with the sign of the Cross on their foreheads:

Do not harm the earth or the sea or the trees, till we have sealed the servants of our God upon their foreheads. (Rev 7:3)

It is the hour of the return of the Prodigal Sons; it is the Hour of Mercy before the Hour of Justice.

“You must know that I always love my children, my beloved creatures, I would turn Myself inside out so as not to see them struck; so much so, that in the gloomy times that are coming, I have placed them all in the hands of my Celestial Mama—to Her have I entrusted them, that She may keep them for Me under Her safe mantle. I will give Her all those whom She will want; even death will have no power over those who will be in the custody of my Mama.” Now, while He was saying this, my dear Jesus showed me [how]… She marked Her dear children and those who were not to be touched by the scourges. Whomever my Celestial Mama touched, the scourges had no power to touch those creatures. Sweet Jesus gave to His Mama the right to bring to safety whomever She pleased. —Jesus to Luisa Piccarreta, June 6th, 1935; The Crown of Sanctity: On the Revelations of Jesus to Luisa Piccarreta by Daniel O’Connor, p. 269 (Kindle Edition)

 

CHOSEN

This is all to say that Our Lady’s Little Rabble is not necessarily special… just chosen.

And she is inviting you.

What must you do? The first thing is to simply, right now, say “yes”—fiat. To pray something like this: 

Lord, I present myself to You right now, as I am. And my “as I am” is more like Matthew as he sat at his table collecting taxes; or like Zacchaeus hiding up in a tree; or like the adulterous laying accused in the dirt; or like the good thief hanging by a thread; or like Peter declaring, “Depart from me, for I am a sinful man, O Lord.” ^[2]Luke 5:8 To each of these, You accepted their “Take me as I am.” And so, with a firm act of my will, I offer You now all that I am, as I am. In this way, I also take Mary as my Mother, she whom You have placed, after You, at the head of Your Celestial army. With that, Lord, I pray: “What must we do, to be doing the works of God?” ^[3]John 6:28

I will explain some specific “first steps” in these next few writings and sharing something powerful that happened to me last month. In the meantime, I leave you with this word from Our Lady that I received eight years ago in the presence of my spiritual director. It is a Now Word for the present hour…

Little ones, do not think that because you, the remnant, are small in number means that you are special. Rather, you are chosen. You are chosen to bring the Good News to the world at the appointed hour. This is the Triumph for which my Heart awaits with great anticipation. All is set now. All is in motion. The hand of my Son is ready to move in the most sovereign way. Pay careful attention to my voice. I am preparing you, my little ones, for this Great Hour of Mercy. Jesus is coming, coming as Light, to awaken souls steeped in darkness. For the darkness is great, but the Light is far greater. When Jesus comes, much will come to light, and the darkness will be scattered. It is then that you will be sent, like the Apostles of old, to gather souls into my Motherly garments. Wait. All is ready. Watch and pray. Never lose hope, for God loves everyone.