Our Desperate Need for Protection
The Feast of the Immaculate Conception.
Five shots rang out.
The victim was riddled with bullets through his back, fell through a plate-glass window and was dead in 10 minutes.
John Lennon, the former Beatle, was murdered.
Murdered by an insane man who once received commendations for his work as a Christian counselor with children.
Murdered by an insane man who then, in a desperate search for his own identity, rejected Christ and began praying to the “other” one.
Murdered by an insane man who battled within himself just before he committed the heinous crime to listen to his adult voice of reason over the ravings of the “child” he said was within himself. A child the murderer, Mark David Chapman, said prayed to the evil one as Lennon exited his limousine for the strength to kill the ex-Beatle because the worldwide “star” was his!
John, shot in the back, never knew what hit him.
He never had a chance at that moment in time to verbally ask Jesus for forgiveness as his body instantaneously went into shock before he bled to death.
From all indications of his life and what John professed publicly, he never knew the Virgin Mary.
Perhaps John — who once stated that the Beatles were “bigger” than Jesus (he later was forced to apologize for the remark), then groveled at the feet of an Indian yogi (faker is a better word) until he realized he had been fooled and taken for a financial ride, and despicably sang a song entitled “God” on his first solo album in which he screamed, “I don’t believe in Jesus” — didn’t know Christ either.
In this story of sadness — a man who literally had the world at his feet — John Lennon’s fate for Eternity has been sealed.
We do not know what that fate is; but we do know this: John Lennon did not have the protection of the Ever-Virgin Mary that night that he was murdered by an insane individual who turned his back on Christ and embraced the evil one seeking the same worthless worldly fame the ex-Beatle once enjoyed.
And that is the point of this story.
We are coming up on the Feast of Our Lady of Mount Carmel July 16th, and what have we done as individuals to follow Her admonitions?
What have we done to protect ourselves from the evil that lurks at every corner of life to avoid the tragic ending not only John experienced, but as so many humans have since Cain struck Abel.
The point we are making is there are heavenly remedies to this fate.
One is the Agnus Dei, a Sacramental of the Church that the popes no longer exercise in creating. The Agnus Dei is a small cake of wax mixed with chrism and impressed with a figure of the Lamb of God on it. Previous to Paul VI, popes would bless the Agnus Dei in the first year of their pontificate and every seven years thereafter.
Among the protective powers of this Sacramental, as the Chamberlain to His Holiness, X. Barbie de Montaut, in 1904 pointed out, is the believer’s ability to “avert dangers and misfortunes … pitfalls of the enemy … plagues and epidemics” and, most importantly, “a safeguard against sudden and unforeseen death.”
We are grateful that from the pontificate of St. Pius X, a Franciscan nun and friend of our family has given three of these Sacramentals to our loved ones.
John Lennon had no concept and probably never heard of the Agnus Dei.
Another forgotten gift of God is the Green Scapular Mary gave to Sister Justine Bisqueyburu, a Daughter of Charity of St. Vincent de Paul, the same order of nuns St. Catherine Laboure (an incorruptible!) was in. St. Catherine gave us, as another gift from Mary to protect us, the Miraculous Medal.
The Green Scapular, twice approved by Pius IX, the pontiff who gave us the dogma of the Immaculate Conception, is well known for its miraculous cures and conversions.
While these are only some of the many gifts the Lord has granted through Himself (don’t forget the St. Benedict medal!) and the Hands of His Mother, we want to focus, as we approach this feast day, on the extremely important, and seemingly forgotten, Brown Scapular.
It was in 1251 that Mary, as Our Lady of Mount Carmel, appeared to St. Simon Stock, the general of the Carmelite order at the time, and said to him, “Whosoever dies wearing this Scapular shall not suffer eternal fire.”
Wow! Now that’s a promise and an outward sign we can hold on to!
Mary told the Carmelite Saint that we should “wear the Scapular devoutly and perseveringly. It is My garment. To be clothed in it means you are continually thinking of Me, and I in turn, am always thinking of you and helping you to secure eternal life.”
The spiritual director of St. Margaret Mary Alacoque — the great Saint whose visions gave us the Feast of the Sacred Heart of Jesus — had this to say about the Brown Scapular. The director, canonized as St. Claude de la Colombiere, said, “Because all the forms of our love for the Blessed Virgin and all its various modes of expression cannot be equally pleasing to Her — and therefore do not assist us in the same degree to reach Heaven — I say, without a moment’s hesitation, that the Brown Scapular is the most favored of all. No devotion has been confirmed by more numerous authentic miracles than the Brown Scapular!”
Does anyone know why we are not seeing “authentic miracles” today as a result of expressing our love for Mary through the Brown Scapular?
It is because HARDLY ANYONE IS WEARING IT ANYMORE!!!
It has become passe.
It is something of the past and not in the “spirit” of Vatican II!
How many times does the Lord have to tell us that Christ is the same yesterday, today and for ever!
What was pleasing to the Lord and His Mother 752 years ago is still pleasing — and perhaps, in this time of apostasy — even more pleasing today.
How fascinating that St. Alphonsus de Liguori would make this statement so long ago and, yet today, its application seems even more apropos, especially for those who fit this description within the Church: “Modern heretics make a mockery of wearing the Scapular. They decry it as so much trifling nonsense.”
Previous to Vatican II, on the 700th anniversary of the Queen of Heaven’s gift, the pope who promulgated the dogma of the Assumption of Mary, Pius XII, referred to the Brown Scapular as “the Sign of Consecration to the Immaculate Heart of Mary!”
He didn’t say “a” sign.
He said “the” sign.
It is not an accident, as we point out as often as we can, how spiritual events interrelate with temporal events.
It was on July 13, 1917 that Mary showed the young seers of Fatima the vision of hell “where the souls of poor sinners go.”
It is not an accident that three days later, we celebrate the Feast of Our Lady of Mount Carmel, a date to remember the gift that Mary gave us to not only save us from the fires of hell, but to release us from the purifying flames of Purgatory on the first Saturday — the day traditionally dedicated to the Immaculata — after one’s death if one dies with their Scapular on.
Today, many do not wear the Scapular — even many of those who are consecrated to the Immaculate Heart of Mary.
Some say that the Scapular is uncomfortable to wear and that it “irritates” their back.
This, again, is good.
The Scapular should irritate one’s back.
It is to remind us of the Crossbeam Jesus carried across His scapular — Latin for the shoulder area. In a vision, Jesus told St. Bernard, a strong Marian advocate, that the most grievous of all His wounds was His right shoulder blade where the Crossbeam irritated His back. What a small price to pay for the Scapular’s irritation as opposed to Purgatory’s irritating flames!
There are other excuses for not wearing the Scapular, despite Mary’s request — requests which were made not as our “sister,” as protest-ants call Her, but as our Queen and Mother!
Perhaps one of these could be the complaint about the expense of buying a Scapular — they are extremely “expensive” and can range from the outrageous wallet-emptying cost of 75 cents to a whopping $5.00!
Or perhaps one lives in an area with there are no Catholic bookstores for thousands of miles and it would be an “inconvenience” to obtain one.
Even, as a more absurd excuse, one could say, “But I am NOT a Catholic.”
Well, guess what. The Scapular is NOT just for Catholics. The Brown Scapular is for everybody and CAN BE WORN BY ANYONE.
Even John Lennon could have worn one.
It is not a requirement that one be a Catholic to receive the graces Mary is promising through this great gift!
The only necessary requirement is belief!
For one to have the faith of a child in the promise of our Mother!
For belief and the faith of a child are everything!
By wearing the Scapular of the Blessed Virgin, one identifies one’s self — especially in the invisible spiritual world where the battle rages intensely — as to which side we are on. Angels, both good and bad, know who we belong to when we wear the Scapular! And Mary promises those who wear this outward sign and honor Her — an important requirement — that we will be protected from “danger.”
We began this article with one of the most heartbreaking stories: the murder of John Lennon. When we were younger, we followed the Beatles, loving their music and delighting in their antics.
We have since grown up — not physically, but spiritually.
We wish we had known John personally — not at the height of his fame, but when he was searching for the Truth. We wish we could have talked to him about God. We wish we could have shown him our knowledge of the Shroud and the Truth it bespeaks of.
But we didn’t and, because of the ways life takes us, we couldn’t.
We do not know where John is today.
But we are certain that if John knew the Blessed Virgin, he would never have been murdered on Her feast day in an “unforeseen death.”
Yes, of course, God allows the death of martyrs under the protection of His Mother, such as St. Maximilian Kolbe; but they knew their time had come and prepared themselves to meet their Savior.
John did not have that time.
It was stolen from him.
Stolen because he was not under the protection of the Virgin Mary.
Stolen because he chose to live in a house — the Dakota apartments of New York City — where an evil movie, Rosemary’s Baby, was filmed that was nothing more than a satanic mimic of Mary as the Mystical Rose, and Her Baby, the Fruit of Her Womb and Savior of the world.
We wish John had a Scapular on him that night.
We wish John — who had met his killer earlier in the day as he left his home for the studio, signing an autograph for his soon-to-be murderer, and specifically and oddly asked the insane Chapman as he looked into his killer’s eyes, “Is there anything else you want?” — had, instead, looked into the Mother of God’s eyes and asked for Mary to cover him in Her Virginal Mantle with the Angels and Saints to protect him.
But he didn’t.
Unfortunately, John, who searched for Truth and looked in all the wrong places, has no ultimate excuse.
But those around him are just as guilty in this failure. No one seriously told him to do these things. He was trapped in a world that did not know Christ, from his broken home to his successful career.
As such, we plead with the Lord for mercy on his soul, if at all possible.
We, as Catholics however, have no excuse.
The Church, which today fails to teach and speak about the importance of the Scapular to the faithful, has no excuse.
Its scandals bespeak of its need for protection and its lack of properly asking for it.
Most of us all have children.
They are in danger every day — every time they walk out the door. The world wants to make John Lennons out of all of them.
It is the evil one’s plan to steal and rob the souls of the world from the Mother of God — for every person, if they but seek it, has the right to eternal salvation through the Blood of Mary’s Son.
That salvation, however, must be asked for, sought after and protected when received. The insane Chapman is a perfect example of those who asked, but were not protected to maintain their salvation in Christ.
In comprehending this tragedy, we must fight to protect the souls of children. Whether they are the souls of family, Church members, neighborhood, city, state or nation. For every soul has an infinite value before God.
We cannot win this battle. It is impossible.
We do not have the power.
Unless we turn to Mary.
Mary has that promise to win the battle.
Mary has those graces.
Mary has marked out the path for us.
Mary has given us the Scapular.
Our failure to give it to others or wear it ourselves may not constitute a “sin.”
But it is a grave error before God and sheer stupidity on our part to ignore such an easy way for us to save ourselves and souls from eternal perdition; and, as a bonus, assist them to be free of Purgatory within, at the most, a week of their demise.
We bet our proverbial spiritual dollar that if John Lennon could talk to the world today, he would ask us not to buy his records, but to buy his loved ones a Scapular. To tell those he cares about not to speak against Christ and to honor the Lord’s Mother. That he would have been better off that evening so long ago to not go to the studio, but instead, go to a Church and honor Mary on the feast of Her Immaculate Conception.
Unfortunately, for John and all those like him who have passed on — whether Saints or sinners — they can no longer do that for their loved ones.
We, however, cannot only do it for ourselves but for those we claim to love.
What if our loved ones, however, laugh and refuse to wear the greatest gift Mary can give us?
Even if they refuse to wear it, as Mary taught, put the Scapular, without their knowledge, around a picture of that person so that She may still, in our deep belief, grant graces to that soul who has rejected Heaven’s easiest way to avoid hell and get out of Purgatory. And then bind them to Her Immaculate Heart in the prayers of the Rosary.
It is the least we can do, in light of the tragic lesson of John Lennon’s murder, for those we love and who — ourselves included — are in desperate need of Mary’s protection.
© 2003 Agnus Dei Presents!
