A REMARKABLE CHAPTER.

New Zealand Tablet, Volume II, Issue 68, 15 August 1874, Page 13

A REMARKABLE CHAPTER.

!wi&? M g " ??T B recentl y PnMished life, in English, of wkh - rSS ttaUtT aUt ° f - th f- L ° rd ,' Anna Maria Taigi.' The process, ™T« I 4 oanpnuation of this holy woman* was commenced some years ago, but it has not yet got beyond the first stage. She has, lSa£-n, V* officiall yT that , » juridically-declared Venerable dnl™SPw n °« 0V n than that fche fame of her Banctifc y bad been S ELT bffore the Congregation of Rites, the proper tribunal in such cases. The official documents containing an account of the process bo far, and the B worn testimony of tha several witneeses examined SLSfl^rn" 10^ £ Ye *?* b6en yet P ublißned 3 nor will they till her fb£ «;S 10 Yi hOUI l BUCh - eVer tßke placa - For tho "tatements, thereJSLSJ at nC v" "U0 authorit 7 b eyond ordinary historical TWU TheCh " rchlß »°o ™y committed to these statements. S?£ tv, ?qUeßtly>? qUeßtly> B1 ? free . to re J ect or acCß P fc them according to the value they place upon the evidence in support of them. Anna Maria «$? J? f ?m m na ,' ba } brou B ht U P in Rome, where she received whLS a8 "T llv l alls t0 the lot of very poor people, and wa B lilc ft h« ma i7 led Wh6n ab ° Ut twen * y ears of age Her husband Z^ ?Tf J a B ?n? aßfc ° f the HH ° ÜBe Of W Sh « co « ld Znr«ol V J 7 b^ Wa - Ullt ? rat c. Her life, however, was heroic in the practice of all Cnnstian virtues, as has been amply proved by the omuslX 7'7 ' Shedi6d iQ 1837 '" ne 7°™ before the election PBOPHEOIES COKOEENINO FIITS IX. AKD HIS BMGN. r,»** An T- M^s^ved the election of Gregory XVI. only six 111 y ear ! before Pius IK/was chosen to fiU JLlil Sf» I' - She had BeeQ . h0 »«^r, all the events of his PontifiwcordeSfn^ P° ÜBBUn ' bUfc fol> th ° PP 1*686"*1 * 686 "* theße details, though recorded in ihe Processes, are not given to the public; it becomes mE? r - S " bb J ected *° «»s test, many of them will be found to rest upon satisfactory authority. We shall devote this chapter to recording r^JS 8 traUßp . ired ?l mO9t inteießfc concerning this" t. us, the moat !I« hi gg ff P ° A n °- u her ProPhecieß.P ro P hecieB . Hmiting ourselves to those which God. referred wth mOßfc oettnnty to the Venerable Servant of him LU T et gi ? C % tbe / ollowin X Particulars as communicated to An^'a M?£ tTS 7 dayS ° f Pi ° 9 IX ' by an estimable P rießt iQ whom sWein wr>" greatest confidence, and who a&o attested the She »P°K says Mgr. Luquet, «one day to this 5Ki w- PM ? WUtMra Which the Ch " rch WBS to undergo, hannnv S" v TPWUIT PWU I meQ WOuld d 0 at Rome . as »c un&baJ o?Po ?Pr fiedi v\ Dd Bhe P^ticularised what he who conducted «ff would Jir *°" ld . h8 v e i° BUffer ' Wißhin g t0 kQOW who tl«» l*on!fe reSL Uh ***£"*** asked her if h « ™ then among the Cardinals ; SLSI^ t 7-1* f^ but thafc he was a humble priest not ai in fcj TMw^ 1 ' 60 . 111 Stateß « but iQ * ve ry distant country. And, to&uLw ate ¥ aßfa 7 a « a simple priest attached at that period she saifSai *] T & m i? h v U , AnMa Mariad ««^ibed the future Pontiff : W^nM •f ! ° U H be elect * d in an extraordinary manner; that ln.7^"^duce reforms ; that, if men were gratefJl for them, the H^saU le r?? them with , bleßßin g 8 » b *t that, if they abuaeHhem! amof oS ? S * b - h S loo9e againßt tbe bark of Pct «r 5 that the S ? far , Mgr ; Lu iuet, writing above twenty years ago. mumcation on this subject which the servant of God received but Ta S ea°w ZS" Tl^- 7 BUppHed what i 8 elsewhe <-c "-iertod, 'that bll,eld rtS Sir? T\ CS ' etUl ' niDg % the boßom of the Ohurdi and wi Ihi In X P\ ll l g behaviour a 8 well as that of all the faithful It will be seen that the nature of the chastisement which isVo Secede «'it PI ? 6 " -T fc T cified « at least in co much of t"e 7evSation *> A?! wThTn °led1 ed fittiD ? { °\ the P resent to lav before the pub! iic. All will be fully known when the cause has proceeded to it 8 com J.U *io Q , and the honors of beatification have been awarded to he\ whom wvu-kol, Pontiff has already declared Venerable. Bur! SthTJu Z nature of the judgment and punishment which she foretold was to evcrtake the persecutors and oppressors of the Church is not prJdselv defined in any authoritative document, yet private indivMs E sp. ken of it, and, in particular, one whose testimony is unquesHonable »»adyh e r confidant D. Raffaeie Natali, to whom, undS7bedience she mace known all her revelations, and who God willed ehouH ,v. uve her so many years. This scourge, he told many persons was to be a supernatural darkness, whi*h was to orevail for three da^ duung which bleteed candles would alone give li»hr. 7 It will ali-eody liave been observed^ in the passages which we have quoted from the • Analecta/ that during several oonseoutii i»« £,« Maria B aw tlw world eaveloped iv a dense and awful darkuesJf J£m-

fir 7 •**? me of walls and timber « as if a Bpea*B pea * edifice were crumbling into fragments. As, however, the servant of God saw many allegorical figures and representations in her sun, the question would ?; l i{F em . a P whether moral or physical darkness were signified. But if this vieion be identical with the one mentioned by D. Raffaeie, there is every reason for concluding that the latter is the correct reading of. the prophecy. Her confidant must have bad the beat opportunities mJSfc^fS" T* d ? nd heariDg her "Potions, and, indeed, the mention of blessed candles alone giving light seems to show that the darkness foretold is to be real and sensible, not figurative. We may consider it therefore ascertain that Anna Maria foretold a judgment of three days darkness, and that, not only Because we have the testimony of persons to whom D. Raffaeie confided the fact, but also because P. Cahxte's Life of the servant of God, in which this predictoon is confidently attributed to her, hag (as he himself declares in connection with this subject) be«n carefully examined at Rome and pronounced to be the most exact and conformable to the Apostolic process** of ay hitherto < published. This favorable judgment, one may naturally conclude, would certainly not have been expressed had he ventured on an assertion not borne out by her recorded and attested prophecies, which are reserved under the seals of the sacred congregßtion of Rites, SnLl a M dd a hat ?' J Pf Xte ' 8 Work was a PP^d g of by hi 8 own Superior, the General of the Trinitarians and Postulator of her own cause. If, however, it might be deemed rash positively to decide that the predicted darkness will be physical, it would be something more than rash to ridicule the idea of such an occurrence being preposterous and absurd. Ihe very state of men's minds, so prone to regard any intervention of God in his material creation as a tiling out of date, if not a species of impossibility, renders it perhaps the more likely that God nas reserved such a judgment as a lesson ta the present soepticat generation. Some remarks to this effect made by M. Amed6j Nisolas, a Ifrench avocai, in a late publication, appears to be much to the point. • True it is,' he says, • that men everywhere laugh at the idea ot such an event occurring, and regard it as a dream : so they laughed at the deluge during the hundred years that Noe was employed in constructing the ark. As for me, I do not affirm that the darkness foretold will be physical darkness; but ft does seem to me that the u 8 i 8U J - 7 Berious for me n to abstain from scoffing at it j and both history and Scripture prophecy as well as the state of mind's at the present epoch, may well justify apprehensions on this subject. Seeing that three dayg of physical darkness occurred in Egypt, it follows that we may have ihe same again in our time ; lor if a thing has once been, we must conclude that it can be. The Apocalypse, at the opening of the sixth seal, seems to me to predict darkness, when it says that suddenly there shall be a great earthquake, and that " the sun shall become black as .ackcloth of hair;" and if we have arrived at this period in the duration of the world, how shall we be able to see when the sun gives no light P» (We shall be in darkness.) ' The erron and corruption of men are at the present time deeper than those of JSgypt m Pharaoh's days; atheism and materialism reign supreme among the masses. An event partially divine is needed, in order that people should return to a belief in the existence of God and the spiritual world. Now this darkness would be an irrefragable proof, to which there could be no reply ; and thorefore it is more opportune and more.necessary than that of Egypt. The same 6th chapter of the Apocalypse, renewing a prediction already uttered by the prophet Isaias, announces that " the kings of the earth, and the princes, and the tribunes, and the rich, and the strong, and every bondman, and every freeman " Bhall be seized with roch dread on witnessing this cataclysm of nature, that they shall hide themselves " in the dens and in the rocks and mountains," and say to the mountains aiid the rocks, " fall upon us, and hide us from the face of him that sitteth upon the throne, and from the wrath of the Lamb ; for the great day of their wrath is come, and who shall be able to stand P' This horrible scene does not belong to the convulsions at the end of the world, for it is followed by a great religious renewal ; it does not refer to the judgment of the- dead, but to a sort of judgment of the living, which may be signified by those words of David: " Judicabit in nationibut, implebit ruinasS' And what fact could occur which would strike such great terror ? And if its results should be the conversion of the world to Jesus Christ, would it not be a great blessing for our human race, so widely gone astray, and ought it not to be desired and earnestly begged of God by those who desire that His name should be hallowed, His kingdom come, and His will be done earth- as it is iv heaven ?'