OUR LADY OF PERPETUAL SUCCOUR.

New Zealand Tablet, Volume XIV, Issue 46, 11 March 1887, Page 5

OUR LADY OF PERPETUAL SUCCOUR.

In order that no kind of grace might be wanting in the most sweet advocate of men, the Blessed Virgin Mary, we may justly say that God in His divine counsel wished that her pictures should ever be held in great honour, and become famous by wonders and miracles. Amongst these pictures, that of Our Lady of Perpetual Buccour holds a distinguished place ( Breviary). Description of the picture.— The miraculous picture of Our Blessed Lady of Perpetual Succour is only twenty-two inches in height by eighteen inches in width. It is painted on a gold ground. Our Lady, in half figure, holds her divine Son on her left arm, and with her right Band she presses the tiny hands of the Child to her breast. She wears a dark azure mantle, lined with green. The tunic is red, and, like the mantle,edged with gold. The folds of the dress are marked by gilded lines. Above the figure of our Lady are the Greek letters MY OP (Mother of God). The Infant Jesus is represented as a grown child. One of His sandals has fallen off ; He clasps His Mother's arms in terror as if He wished to seek refuge in her bosom from the instruments of His Passion, which the Angels are presenting to Him. Near His head are the Greek letters IC XC (Jesus Christ) . On the right of the Blessed Virgin is the figure of the Archangel Michael, who carries in a vase the lance and the sponge. Above him are Greek letters OAP M (The Archangel Michael). To the left is the St. Gabriel, who presents to the Divine Infant the cross and the nails. Above him are the Greek letters OAP T (The Archangel Gabriel). The faces of the Virgin and Child are amiable indeed, but stamped with an expression of deep sadness. Tne eyes of the Virgin Mother are turned upon the beholder, with a sad and reproachful expression, which seems to say : Cease to off end my divine Child, and I will be to you a Mother of Perpetual Succour. The picture is the work of a devout and skilful master, The style is Grecian, and, according the best judges, it muat have been painted in the 13th or 14th century. Historical account of the Picture. — The picture of Our Blessed Lady of Perpetual Succour, of which many copies are now venerated throughout the whole wjrld, was brought from the island of Crete to Borne in the 15th century. It remained for some time in a private house, until, by a special interposition of Divine Providence, it was publicly, and with great solemnity, placed in the Church of St. Matthew, under the care of the Augustinian Fathers, on the 27th March 1449. _ Prom thit time until the Church of St. Matthew was destroyed, during the occupation of Rome by the French, between the years 1809-15, it was ranked amongst the miraculous pictures of our Blessed Lady, for which the Eternal City is so renowned. So many and great were the miracles and graces which Almighty God was pleased to grant, through the intercession of Kis Divine Mother, to those who invoked her aid under the title of Perpetual Succour, or of the Madonna of St. Matthew, as she was popularly called, that the Church of St. Matthew became one of the chief places of pilgrimage and a true sanctuary of Mary . ' Upon the destruction of this church, the Angustinian Fathers removed to a small church in another quarter of Rome, and the once famous picture remained for nearly sixty years, hidden and unknown. in a private oratory in their convent. _ Its history, indeed, had been recorded by many writers, but their works were not generally known ; and, as time went on, the devotion to our Blessed Lady of Perpetual Succour and her picture which had deen the channel of so many graces for three hundred years, was forgotten. Is was, however, the will of Almighty God and his Blessed Mother that this devotion should be revived, and that the holy picture shonld be once more venerated by the faithful. On the 11th December, 1865, our Holy Father, Pius IX., was pleased to order that the sacred picture should be publicly exposed in the Church of St. Alphonsus in Rome belonging to the Redemptorist Fathers, and which stands almost on the spot f ormerly occuDied by that of St. Matthew. F This was done with the greatest solemnity on the 26th of April 1866, and on the sth of May following hie Holiness came to the chnrch to visit the holy picture . From that time the devotion to our Lady of Perpetual Succour has continued to spread more and more in the holy city, and in various partg of the Continent. Innumerable engravings of the picture have been printed and distributed in Rome alone. Up to the beginning of 1882, about .eight hundred copies had been demanded by Bishops, priests and others, numbers of which are now exposed to the devotion of the faithful in Austria, France, Germany, Spain, Belgium, Holland, England, Scotland, Ireland, Switzerland. Poland, Denrrark, and Norway ; the United States, Canada, the Republics of Mexico Equador, and Chili ; in Palestine ; in Japan ; and, lastly in Australia. It is also worthy of mention that, in the island of Crete or Candia, from which the original picture was brought, hia lordship the Bishop)

Monsignor Aloysius Cannavo, has procured two copies for public veneration in the towns of Candia and Cania. So great and striking were the graces, spiritual and corporal, obtained by those who visited the Church of St. Alphonsus in Rome, and there invoked our Lady of Perpetual Succour, that, at the general desire of the devoted clients of Mary, the seven parish priests, and the most distinguished inhabitants of that qvurter of Rome in which this church is situated, petitio.ied the Chapter of St. Peter's to crown the holy picture, a mark of distinction conferred only on those pictures and statues in Borne which are celebrated for their antiquity and miraculous graces. The coronation took place oa Sunday, the 23rd June 1867, at the very time when the centenary festival of the holy Apostles had brought to Rome nearly five hundred Bishops, and a multitude of priests, and faithful from all parts of the world. The solemnities of the coronation and the public procession of the sacred picture were attended by numbers of these ; and in this wayAlmighty God has been pleased to extend the knowledge and efficacy of the devotion of our Lady of Perpstual Succour in all tho3e countries from which these venerable and pious pilgrims had come. No day has passed since the coronation which has not drawn new clients to our Lady of Perpetual Succour. And now, ten years after the restoration of the sacred picture, so wide-spread has the devotion of the faithful become, that our Holy Father, Pius IX., by decrees dated 18th May and Ist June 1876, grants : 1 . Proper Office and Mass to be said in honour of our Lady of Perpetual Succour in the Congregation of the Most Holy Redeemer, 2. He raises the Feast to be a doable of the second class. 3. In memory of the solemn coronation of the picture, he appoints the Feast to be kept on the Sunday before the Nativity of St. John the Baptist. In fine, his Holiness has been graciously pleased to make the ' Pious Union,' already established in honour of Our Lady of Perpetual Succour and St. Alphonsus, an Arch-confraternity . The most Rev. Father General of the Congregation of the Most Holy Redeemer is Director of this Arch-confraternity, and he has power to aggregate other confraternities to it, and to communicate to their members the faculties, graces, and indulgences which have been granted to the Arch - con f ratern i ty . This, then, is a brief notice of the holy picture of Our Lady under the consoling title of Perpetual Succour. Who is there that ia not in need of succour every moment of his life ? And when has there been a time in which Divine succour was more needed by the Holy Church, by the Vicar of its Divine Head, and by all the faithful, than at the present ? It is a time for perpetual unwearying prayer for perpetual and unfailing help. Those who feel this — and who is the Catholic that does not feel it ?— need not be urged to fly for succour to her who is the channel of all graces. For themselves, for the Holy Church, for the Sovereign Pontiff, for his faithful children in Rome and throughout the world, and for his enemies, they will, with confidence, invoke the Immaculate Mother, and will not weary in repeating again and again, ' O Blessed Lady of Perpetual Succour, pray for us now, and at the hour of our death. Amen.'