The mystery of the Immaculate Conception in the divine economy. To believe in this mystery which is, as it were, the deepest abyss of the Creator and of the mystery of Redemption. It is this that is so astonishing. And if I look at the mystery of the Immaculate Conception precisely in the perspective of divine economy, I can indeed say that here I touch two extremes in the same mystery of love. It is the abyss of the mystery of creation, for Mary is the creature par excellence. I believe that we will discover this in heaven. Creature par excellence means the smallest and most fragile creature with respect to creation, with respect to spiritual beings of course. It is she who most acutely knew and was most aware of her poverty, her fragility, and her dependence. Saint Thomas' vertibile ad nihilo is particularly present here. "Vertigo before nothingness." It is the creature that becomes conscious of that which it is. Before God there is this vertigo. There is an abyss in Mary's soul which we cannot attain because we do not go far enough. There is an abyss which Mary's intelligence grasped. Her intelligence is immaculate for this: to be particularly sensitive and vulnerable to this vertibile ad nihilo. It is the spiritual being that becomes conscious of its total dependence upon God. Nothing of what it has is its own. If our intelligence is particularly perspicacious and enlightened, we know this. If our intelligence is ordered towards love, we know this. An intelligence ordered towards love is an intelligence ordered towards adoration, for the most fundamental love of the creature is the love of adoration.
And so, for Mary, this love of adoration is the most fundamental love in her. And her intelligence, in its most penetrating aspect, is this sense of vertigo with regard to nothingness which permits her to adore as no other creature was able. After the adoration which exists in Jesus' heart, no other creature adored with as much intensity, lucidity, and love as Mary. Mary's intelligence is in service of her love. This unique sense that she had did not cease to grow. The littleness of the creature in Mary did not cease to grow from the very beginning. And it is this that we look at in the mystery of the Immaculate Conception. She is the one who, in her intelligence, is totally turned towards this radical love of the creature for the Creator.

The other abyss is the mystery of the plenitude of grace which, from the very beginning, in Mary, surpasses the greatest of saints at the end of their lives. And this grace did not cease to increase so as to attain to the plenitude of grace in Jesus' heart. For we believe that Mary, in an ecstasy of love at the end of her life, which rested upon an act of adoration, rejoined the plenitude of love of Jesus' heart.

And so we are in the presence of these two abysses. One abyss calling the other abyss. The abyss of the fragile creature who wants to go further in the poverty of its intelligence. And then there is poverty of heart. This is an abyss of gratuitous love and mercy which envelops Mary, the Woman clothed with the sun. It is this plenitude of grace which is given to her. She is born in the Holy Spirit, in the love of the Holy Spirit which, from the very beginning, knows a plenitude and which, at the end, in her ecstasy of love, knows a plenitude so much like that of Jesus. And so, if she is born in love, her ultimate ecstasy is in love and in the Holy Spirit. The mystery of the Immaculate Conception envelops Mary's entire life just like the mystery of Glory. It is not just a single particular mystery. She is unceasingly born. From the point of view of grace, we can say that our contemplative life consists in living under the breath of the Holy Spirit, that is, the eternal birth of which Jesus speaks to Nicodemus: "born of water and the spirit." To be born again. Mary did not need to be born again. It is proper to Mary. She lived this Immaculate Conception her entire life. I think that we can say that this is the secret of her origin and her contemplation. To be born in the Holy Spirit. To be so bound to the Holy Spirit that it is the love of the Holy Spirit which communicates itself to her in plenitude through the wounded heart of her Beloved. Mary lived this in the obscurity of faith and the poverty of hope, but in the intensity of love.

We do not know the date but we do know that this mystery of eternity began in her soul from the moment of her Immaculate Conception. Mary lived this mystery of love her entire life and she increasingly knew how much she was loved. All love comes from God and all love goes back to God.

And so we can say that the mystery of the Immaculate Conception, from the point of view of the divine economy, represents the abyss of the littleness of the creature and the abyss of the gratuitousness of love which completes all. Mary responded through adoration and contemplation and the simple and loving gaze of one who lives the gift of God's love. She lived this mystery without naming it. It is the Church that names it. Mary named it afterwards. When we love we do not give a name to what we live. It is like Saint John who does not name himself in the episode of his encounter with Jesus. He only names Andrew. Mary never sought to know where she stood with regard to God. It is only we who make a problem of this. For Mary it was not a problem. She was too docile to the Holy Spirit. The poorest and smallest of creatures only sought to love. And she knew that love cannot be said. She knew that love can only be lived. Hence the most profound of silences in her soul. It is this unity with the Holy Spirit, in Jesus' heart and in the Father's attraction.

We must look at this mystery of the Immaculate Conception because it is given to us. It is our mystery, we, Christians of the twentieth century. We must live by this mystery. We look at it in Mary and we try to understand what the Church defines with regard to it: she, who by a unique privilege and anticipated mercy, did not experience what all of the descendents of Adam and Eve do, i.e. original sin. She is a descendent of Adam and Eve and, from this point of view, she is small. But, free from sin, she is first and so elevated in love. The Church specifies that it is a prevenient grace. Not only is there no fault, but the consequences of sin never existed in Mary. The devil knows nothing of Mary whereas he has known us from the beginning. He knows all of the contours of our psychology and he knows which strings to pull and he has a grand time doing so. He knew us before we knew ourselves. He knew us before Jesus saved us, which is why he is called the prince of this world. In philosophical terms, we would say first in a genetic order. So, in the divine economy, what is first are the wounds we experience from this.

Yet he is completely ignorant of Mary. And so he is frustrated, for amongst the descendants of Adam and Eve there is one who escapes him, one whom he does not know. This explains his anger. The frustration of an intellectual, especially one like the devil, is what is most frightful. He thinks he has rights over the descendants of Adam and Eve. This prevenient grace of the Father's gratuitous mercy is such that the devil knows nothing of Mary. In reality, the devil has no rights. It is something permitted by God and so God can, by the merits of the Cross and by His simple desire, allow one of Eve's descendents to completely escape his ascendancy. In this way, the Father reminds him that he has no rights. It is this that humiliates him most. Perhaps it is by the simple fact that she exists that the Woman crushes the head of the serpent. There is nothing that humiliates the devil more than the mystery of the Immaculate Conception. God did not bring it about for this. That is obvious. But it is a consequence. Here we see the psychology of the proud. The proud translates a permission into a right, which is exactly what the devil did. And in the face of this, God envelops His beloved child in His mercy to protect her. Here we see the enmity between the Woman and the serpent.

The mystery of the Immaculate Conception is also the plenitude of Christian grace which Mary receives from Jesus. She is the first Christian. As I said before, her grace surpasses that of the saints and, at the end of her life, it surpasses that of the seraphim and the cherubim. She had a unique plenitude which is why everything is present in her and why she is Queen. This plenitude of grace comes to her from the mystery of the Redemption as a free gift. Here we understand how much the mystery of the Redemption is a mystery of the source of gratuitous love, for its fruit par excellence is Mary.

Why this mystery of the Immaculate Conception? So that Mary could consecrate herself fully. So that Mary could be a pure bride for Joseph. So that her love might be totally purified. So that she might be a worthy mother of Jesus, radically poor in her divine maternity. So that she might be able to accompany Jesus during his apostolic life. So that she might be able to live the mystery of the Compassion and of the Eucharist. So that everything she lived might have a unique height and a unique depth. In each one of her mysteries, we can find the Immaculate Conception, thereby giving it a unique intensity.

The mystery of the Immaculate Conception helps us to enter into the mystery of the Holy Spirit. If it is here that He most communicated Himself to a creature, then it is here that we can discover Him in the most astonishing way. If the Holy Spirit is love, then when He communicates, He communicates Himself. He gives Himself. Love, in its most powerful aspect, is the gift of self. And when we speak of divine love, which is a substantial love, it cannot but be the gift of self.

And so this communication is the Holy Spirit Himself who is born in our souls. The bond between the Father and the Son is given to us so that we might be conceived and born. With the Holy Spirit, conception and birth are one. On a biological level they are distinct, but on a divine level they are one.

We should try to understand this immaculate conception of the Spirit in Mary for she is the summit of all creatures. It is the Holy Spirit who is eternally born in Mary. It is the Holy Spirit totally given to Mary to sanctify her so that she might return to the Father.

As long as we are here on earth, we do not have a direct vision of God. We await the beatific vision. But once we are in heaven, the vision we have of the Holy Spirit will be through the eyes of the Father and in the Father. And in the vision of the Logos, we will see the Father and the Spirit. It will be in God that we see God. Here on earth, it is in the light of the Immaculate Conception that we can discover the Spirit in the most powerful and amazing way. It is the narrow door of our faith. It is our human condition and our condition as believers. Otherwise we would fall into a sort of illuminism and not accept or recognize our condition as beggars, and we would not understand why Mary is given to us. Mary is given to us so that we might directly penetrate into the mystery. If Mary were not given, I can understand how some would be afraid.

You may say that you try to grasp or understand the Holy Spirit through your mystical experiences. We are always tempted to say or want this. It is fine and good. But because your mystical experiences are lesser than the mystery of the Immaculate Conception, you are taking a less direct road, and you are not entering through the royal path. You are taking a particular path. Mystical experiences are very good, but we need to surpass them. Faith is more and, through our faith, we directly adhere to the mystery of the Immaculate Conception. And in adhering to the mystery of the Immaculate Conception, we immediately enter into the communication of the Holy Spirit and it is the Holy Spirit who takes hold of us. He burned everything in Mary. Mary's heart and soul were completely aflame with this communication of the Holy Spirit, which is why it is the mystery of the Immaculate Conception that renews all of mystical theology. It gives us the most humble yet most royal path. I enter into the mystery of Father, Son, and Holy Spirit through the one who is inseparably united, the one who never placed the least distance between herself and the Holy Spirit, the one who always said yes, the one who was carried by the chariot of fire. And she becomes the chariot of fire for us upon which we penetrate. We realize it is not us, but her for us. But since she is a mother, everything that is hers is ours and everything that is ours is hers. The small child knows that he can enter his or her mother's rhythm. To enter into Mary's rhythm is to enter into the rhythm of the Holy Spirit. We enter into the mystery of the Holy Spirit who is immaculate conception for Mary and for us.

Here it might help us to grasp Maximilian Kolbe's thoughts on this. Let us not forget that Father Kolbe is a son of Saint Francis, and that he is close to Saint Bonaventure. It is part of his grace. Praise the Lord for the Bonaventurians in the Church today, and for the Franciscans. We see how far Father Kolbe went in the Franciscan grace. His last intuition before he was arrested was the same as the first one he had when he went to Lourdes. When he went to Lourdes, he was profoundly struck. He received something from Bernadette for he was small enough to receive. Not directly, but he knew that what Bernadette had received was for him, for Bernadette is given to us. Bernadette heard, "I am the Immaculate Conception." And Bernadette enables us to hear it. We should hide ourselves in the saints in order to hear what they hear and we should know that everything they hear is for us, otherwise they would not be canonized. This is the privilege of the Catholic Church. The Lord gives us step ladders so that we might be as close as possible to Him. And so, in pure faith, we receive from Bernadette. It was like this for Father Kolbe. He received "I am the Immaculate Conception." He knew that there was something unique.

I was thinking this morning of the seven affirmations of Jesus: "I am the Bread of Life"; "I am the Light of the World"; "I am"; "I am the door"; "I am the Son of God"; "I am the Resurrection...." And then there is "I am the Immaculate Conception." It is a modality. It does not add anything, but for the creature it is grand. Mary is she who is thus closest to these seven presences of Jesus. Father Kolbe understood that the mystery of the Immaculate Conception opens a great door unto the Holy Spirit. For the Holy Spirit is for us the Immaculate Conception. He is for us the Immaculate Conception in love so that one day we will all be immaculate.

If Mary is given to us, it is so that the Holy Spirit might carve in us what He carved in Mary. The only difference is that with Mary it took an instant, whereas with us it comes about slowly. The granite in us resists. It is difficult to surpass the consequences of sin to rediscover the spring of the Immaculate Conception. But we know that if we cling to Mary, one day we will be immaculate. We should already be immaculate in the Holy Spirit and in Mary. This is what gives us hope. Be that as it may, fifteen minutes later we may be tempted. But nonetheless the mystery of the Immaculate Conception is given to us. Of course the struggle is then at its paroxysm. We see the abyss of love that is given to us and the poverty in which we find ourselves. We see both and they help us to meet and understand this "saint of the Immaculate Conception." I think we can say that Father Kolbe is the saint of the Immaculate Conception. He was the "lunatic" of the Immaculate Conception. He manifests with such power what the mystery of the Immaculate Conception should be in our lives. This mystery is given to us. It is the royal path.