Maria Valtorta
30 August 1998 14:29
Another contribution from Derek Stone.
In time gone by I was convinced that all ‘automatic handwriting’ was ‘channelling’ and must come from demons, whether a planchette was used or not.
Subsequently I have realized that Satan has no originality. All his works are but counterfeits of those by Our Lord, as demonstrated when Moses and Aaron in front of Phaoroh were aped by the wizardry of the Magicians.
For want of knowing the genuine, I initially bracketed both Maria Valtorta and Mrs Vassula Ryden with the fakes.
Over the weekend 21-24 August, David D. Murray, from the back of the Dandenongs in Victoria, editor of the Australian Maria Valtorta Readers’ Group newsletter, stayed at my home, spoke in the Cream Room of the Mt St Canice Catholic complex, and at her request visited our local hermit, Sr Catherine Maria.
Conscious of the somewhat inhibiting cost of the five volumes of “The Poem of the Man-God”, I was interested to discover David’s origins, and the degree of response among the Catholics of Hobart to Maria Valtorta’s inspired amplification of the Gospels, and to her description of the private lives of many of the characters in the Gospels.
I heard that the main critic of the validity of the now-deceased and formerly bed-ridden Maria Valtorta and her writings from N. Italy during WW2, was the same Jesuit, Mitchell Packwa, from Loyola University, Chicago who also campaigns against Vassula, the Greek Orthodox mystic.
Fr Robert Curmi S.D.B. and some 28 persons on Saturday listened to David D. Murray’s testimony. We learned that this former surveyor and town planner had had a disordered marital life and rebelled against Catholicism. Following a Medjugorje conversion experience, he read “The Poem of the Man-God”. Study of the “The Poem” obliged David subsequently to live the Scriptures. By divine leading he busily engaged in bible cross-referencing, ordering, abstracting and simple distribution of papers on topics put together from the snapshot visions described by Maria. These visions, as published in “The Poem”, follow no logical historical sequence.
In addition to the full translations from the Italian published in Canada, David markets digestible extracts from “The Poem” and her other writings, by topic, much as the publishing house ‘Trinitas’ in the U.S. does on a larger scale for Mrs Vassula Ryden’s dictated work.
What fascinated me most was the guidance given by his spiritual director from the Wagga Diocese,that personally, David should use “The Poem” and the other writings as his springboard into infused contemplation (Prayer of the Heart). This non-discursive prayer is eloquently described by Fr Thomas Dubay in his book, “Fire Within” (Ignatius Press) San Francisco 1989, on Ss Teresa of Avila 1515-1582 and John of the Cross 1542-1591. David quickly sold the only three copies of these which he brought to Hobart.
At one stage we observed David overcome in public by those tears which so often indicate a visitation of the grace of God.
David brought with him one of the original rose petals, less than 4cm across, inside which is a clear picture of Our Lord’s crucified face with crown of thorns. David’s story: “(Around 1994) Eddie, a middle-aged Filipino who lived in a suburb of Toronto, Canada, and has since experienced great suffering including the Stigmata, had a crucifix on his home altar. One day upon coming home from watching sport he noticed that the crucifix had begun to exude oil … many came to his house to pray. One day someone noticed that some of the petals which had fallen from the vases on his altar had images on them. I have seen a few of these petals, with different images including the Crucified Jesus, Our Lady of Sorrows, and St Joseph.”
Despite the age of the rose-petal, it was well preserved. The faith of many in Hobart who scrutinised was encouraged!
A couple of weeks earlier at the Newman Society meeting, the Anglican, Fr David Edmondson, outlined what Dom John Main had initiated, namely, the prayer of the 6,000 world-wide groups of the international equivalents to our local Australian Christian Meditation Community.
The whole thrust of Vassula’s international conference in the Old City of Jerusalem which we had attended a couple of months earlier, had been similarly focussed on the Prayer of the Heart, as had been Fr Slavko’s fasting Retreat in Medjugorje, the year before.
In Jerusalem we noted unity between: Fr Edward O’Connor, a theologian of the U.S. Catholic Charismatic Renewal, Henri le May, Chairman of the Canadian Catholic Charismatic Renewal, Marians like Fr Rene Laurentin, and those who read Maria Valtorta.
Vassula herself, since her conversion in Bangladesh, seems to have read deeply of Teresa of Avila and Symeon the New Theologian, the latter presumably in his native Greek.
The world’s committed laity is ‘coming alive’ in a manner that the Jansenists used to reserve for Cistercian and Carmelite saints.
In view of local clergy inexperience, I, without trust, wondered where the all-essential future Spiritual Directors would come from.
As the Austrians say, “If God gives you a rabbit, he will provide the grass.”
References:
David D. Murray, Maria Valtorta Readers’ Group, 12 Parker Rd, Sylvan Vic 3795 Ph/fax (03) 9737 9228
For an assessment of “The Poem of the Man-God” by a recently beatified Italian bible scholar, see
http://www.bardstown.com/~brchrys/Gablegra/Alegintr.html
