I. "And there was nothing in the temple that was not covered with gold. . ." Like a diamond, which reveals its many facets when struck by light, so is the collection of Marian titles known as the Litany of Loreto. Each one of the titles of Our Blessed Mother preserved in this venerable collection seems, on first sight, to offer a single vantage point from which to view her. However, on closer inspection, we find that they are multifaceted titles, revealing more and more of Mary's glory and prerogatives as we shine more "light" upon them. This article will explore one of these titles-----Domus Aurea, "House of Gold." There are some truly fine treasures to be found herein. In the ancient world, as today, gold was symbolic of "worth", representing a thing whose value cannot be superseded. It epitomized the idea of the precious, and was found in temples and the homes of the wealthy. As with some of the other more intriguing titles from Our Lady's Litany, "House of Gold" finds it's genesis in the Old Testament, in the description of the magnificent Temple built to the Lord by King Solomon, and completed sometime around the year 953 B.C.:
[3 Kgs. 5: 5] Solomon's Temple was built in such a manner for the same reason that Catholic Churches were at one time designed to be places of beauty, where silence, shadow and art combined to call the mind of the faithful away from the mundane world for a time, the better to speak-----and listen-----to God. In short, they were built as earthly dwellings for the Almighty. When the Temple of Solomon was finally dedicated, it was a day of rejoicing:
If an inanimate substance-----refined gold-----can symbolize something precious and perfect, than how much more precious is the Woman, blessed among all women, who would be asked to give her consent to the Divine Maternity, after which she would carry the Living God in her womb for nine months, clothing the Word of God in her own flesh? Truly, the grand Temple built by Solomon, even in its scope and majesty, was but a pale foreshadowing of Mary, the true House of Gold: "You, O Mary, have been made the holy one, and more glorious, more pure, and more saintly than all the rest of humankind, having a mind whiter than snow, and your soul more purified than the finest gold" [St. Gregory Thaumatur + c.270]. II. "The Heart of our amiable Mother is filled with love of God and charity towards us . . ." King Solomon's Temple contained many beautiful objects: the oracle overlaid with gold, the altar covered with cedar and gold, the two cherubims of olive tree, overlaid with gold, the Ark of the Covenant itself, etc. In Book Eight of his Antiquities of the Jews, the historian Flavius Josephus [d. c. 100 AD] relates that the Temple contained, among other things, twenty thousand golden tables, a hundred thousand golden vials, eighty thousand golden dishes and twenty thousand golden censers, plus a comparable amount of objects made from silver. In this sense, the Temple was truly a storehouse of precious things, a depository of all that was intended to be pleasing to God. The Blessed Virgin, like the Temple, is also a storehouse of all that is pleasing to God. She is "full of grace," and in her beautiful soul can be found nothing that does not shine with purity, charity, faith and a burning love for Jesus Christ:
[2 Co. 12: 9]" "Sufficient" grace? Can anyone comprehend he amount of grace which would "suffice" to prepare a woman to receive the Godhead into her womb and give birth to the Incarnate Son of God? "From Heaven did Christ choose for Himself this vessel," wrote St. Ambrose [+397] of Mary, "whereby He might descend, and consecrate it a temple of purity." St. Paul could glory in his weakness, because it provided the catalyst for that grace through which the power of Christ would "dwell" in him. But look at Our Lady. It was Christ Himself Who would dwell in her-----literally. There would be no spiritual "infirmities" to weigh down the thoughts and actions of this Mother. This living 'temple", like the Golden Temple of Solomon, would be consecrated to the Lord, but in a far superior way, for she would choose to give herself entirely to the Blessed Trinity, thus becoming an active participant in God's plan for the redemption of the human race. "Truly the Mother of God is blessed that she gave Him flesh," wrote St. Bede the Venerable [+735], "but she is by far the most blessed of all in that her love for Him excels for all eternity." In short, to understand the dignity of Mary, and the graces bestowed upon her, we must understand the dignity of Jesus Christ, the Author and Source of Grace. If King Solomon could bestow the greatest riches on his Temple, to insure that it would be nothing less than a marvel to all the world, than what riches of beauty and grace could not God Himself bestow upon she who would become His living temple?
Sadly, we live in a time when certain people, including "Catholics", become very uncomfortable when the Blessed Virgin is eloquently praised, as though Our Lord, like some jealous child, would somehow resent our fascination with His "Masterpiece". Of course, the very idea is ludicrous. If we are drawn to Mary, we are drawn to her for the simple reason that God has made her "lovable":
Because of her Divine Maternity, Our Lady was conceived without the stain of Original Sin, and we know that she never committed any manner of sins during her life, for her Immaculate Heart beat in time to the Sacred Heart of her Divine Son, and the very thought of rejecting Him, even for a moment, was completely alien to her:
Catholic theologians have never equated Mary's "fullness" of grace with Christ's "fullness of grace. Whenever we speak of something being "filled", we must always consider the capacity of the object being filled. A thimble that is full of water cannot be compared to a tanker-truck that is full of water, even though both are correctly described as FULL. It is the capacity of each one which determines its effectiveness as a receptacle. In the Book of Acts, St. Stephen is described as "full of grace and fortitude." Yet, this was written before St. Stephen became the Church's first Martyr. With this Martyrdom, Stephen attained his own fullest capacity for grace, like a "receptacle" which had expanded to hold a greater quantity. Just as Solomon's Temple could be filled
with
more and more precious objects, so could Mary's soul merit further
increases
of grace. The Council of Trent taught that such increases can be
This does not contradict earlier references which referred to Mary as a "boundless ocean" of grace. She is, after all, the Immaculate Conception. Her mind and heart were unfettered by concupiscence and confusion, free to love God completely, free to correspond wholeheartedly to the inspirations of the Holy Ghost. In addition, she literally gave the Source of Grace, Our Lord, to the world. St. Thomas Aquinas [+1274] taught that the closer anything approaches to its principle, the more perfect it becomes. As Mother of God, no human being ever was or ever will be closer to the Blessed Trinity than Mary. What unimaginable graces must have been granted to her, allowing her to establish such an intimate familiarity with the Father, Son and Holy Ghost? Full of Grace as she was, Our Blessed Mother could still merit further increases of grace by her own acts of virtue. Considering that her entire mind and heart belonged to God, one can scarcely imagine the value of these virtuous acts. Let us also consider that, after her Son's Ascension into Heaven, Our Lady could receive grace through her reception of the Eucharist. Mary's capacity for the reception of graces increased during her earthly journey, until, at last, she stood on Calvary beneath the Cross of Jesus as Queen of Martyrs and Co-Redemptrix. "So holy and impenetrable is the Heart of Mary," wrote St. John Eudes, "that only God Who enclosed within His treasures of grace and put His seal upon it, can know the quality, quantity and price of the graces hidden in this sealed fountain." Like Solomon's Temple, filled with gold and silver riches, Mary too was indeed a storehouse of precious things: "As all in the Temple was covered with gold, so was everything in the beautiful soul of Our Lady filled with sanctity. [Aquinas] III. "She began to speak and from her beautiful eyes tears also started to flow . . . " King Solomon's Golden Temple was built to be more than a "dwelling place" for God, for whenever God asks that His people labor to build something to His Name, it is always the people who benefit from it. The greatest cathedrals ever built may be paragons of artistic and architectural glory, but in the end, their true value has always resided in the Sacraments administered beneath their vaulted ceilings, and in that most Blessed Sacrament that is housed therein. And so it was with the Temple of Solomon. It was God's people who would benefit by the construction of this marvelous "House of Gold." Within its walls, He would hear their prayers and supplications, accept their offerings, and minister to them in their trials and necessities. In Solomon's prayer, uttered at the dedication of the Temple, we hear words which could also be applied to Catholic Churches, as though to foreshadow these structures that would one day be built to house the Living God, present Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity in their tabernacles. This prayer also foreshadows that Woman who would become the very image of the Church [the "Great Sign" described in St. John's apocalyptic vision, a Woman clothed with the sun, and the moon under her feet, and on her head a crown of twelve stars]:
 The people, by taking refuge in the
Temple, would
place themselves in a position whereby the Lord would hear them and
accept
their supplications: That Thou mayst hearken to the supplication of Thy
servant, and of Thy people Israel, whatsoever they shall pray for in
this
place. We find this attribute of the original Temple mirrored in the
Blessed
Virgin. Because of her role as Mediatrix of All Graces, all our prayers
and petitions to the Lord will pass through her hands. Just as the
Israelites
prayed to God in the refuge of the Golden Temple, where He deigned to
hear
them, so must we pray to Him in the refuge of His "Living" Temple,
Mary.
Just as God showed mercy to His people when they prayed in the Temple,
so are we shown mercy through the intercession of the Mother of
Of course, there is one "target" today that is exempt from all this PC "sensitivity" and "inclusiveness". That target is none other than the only icon of salvation available to a miserable world-----"the Child with Mary His mother," the object of the Wise Men's diligent search after the very first Christmas. The number of blasphemous plays, art exhibits and songs, which have no other reason for existing than to hurl the most obscene insults at Our Lord and Our Lady, is staggering in a world that it so quick to bill itself as more enlightened than earlier, "superstitious" eras. This is why it is important for Catholics to form some idea of the depth of Our Lady's titles, and to know what the great Catholic minds of the past have written about them. This is also why we must praise Mary today with no hesitation, no fear that we may "overdo" it and possibly cause some non-Catholics to run home weeping because of the robust quality of our Marian doctrines. This is why "De Maria Numquam Satis"-----of Mary, there is never enough!-----must be the rallying cry of those who still call themselves "Catholics" and mean it. In our troubled time, many Catholic priests and theologians seem somewhat embarrassed by Our Lady's dignity, and they endlessly equivocate, in the most effeminate manner, concerning her doctrines and dogmas at various Mariological Congresses and "ecumenical" meetings, where, more often than not, they joyfully rub elbows with non-Catholics who couldn't care less about Mary's dignity or honor. Therefore, now would be an ideal time to revive a now outdated attitude which considers the Blessed Virgin's honor as a thing worthy to be cherished and defended. This can be done by familiarizing ourselves with the meaning of and logic behind her doctrines, and thus armed with the Truth, standing ready to defend her from any and all assaults. It is a time to speak bluntly of her glories and prerogatives, and with great affection. As stated earlier, "whenever God asks that His people labor to build something to His Name, it is always the people who benefit from it." The same principle applies to the Immaculata destined to become the Mother of God and Mother of the Church. Mary became the Immaculate Conception to prepare her for her Divine Maternity, to make her a worthy Mother for the Incarnate God. Her beauty of soul, her virginity, her virtues were reserved for One being only-----her Divine Son. She never reveled in her perfection, the way others would, boasting about such gifts of body and soul. On the contrary, look at the words she used to describe herself: "Behold the handmaid of the Lord He hath regarded the humility of His handmaid." Her Divine gifts were never hoarded to bolster her own esteem in the eyes of men, but instead they were spent lavishly upon the Infant of Bethlehem and the youthful Jesus. When Mary's Son had completed the work of Redemption, and ascended to His Father in Heaven, Our Lady's Spiritual Motherhood of the Church was made manifest in the infant Church led by the Apostles. We call her the Mediatrix of all Graces, because such is the role given her by Our Lord, which she now exercises from her throne in Heaven, but we should remember that her powers of intercession were at work even while she walked the earth. We know this from the Gospel reading of the wedding feast at Cana, where Our Lord used the occasion to teach His followers, then and now, about the efficacious maternal concern of His Mother and ours. While this Scriptural event serves as a "paradigm" for the doctrine of Mary's intercessory role in the Church, who can even begin to count the number of other times she interceded for men and women during those years while she still walked among them, especially after Jesus ascended into Heaven, leaving His Church to take her first baby steps . . . under the watchful eye of Mary, her Mother. It is with good reason that the Church applies these words of the Psalms, foreshadowing the Catholic Church, to Mary, the Mother of the Church: "Shall not Sion say, This man and that man is born in her? And the Highest himself hath founded her. [86: 5]" No, Our Lady never hoarded her privileges and Divine gifts while she nurtured Jesus on earth, and she does not do so as she nurtures each of us on our mortal journey to eternity. The wonders of grace filling the true Domus Aurea, the living "House of Gold," are always turned to our benefit. "Know you not that your members are the temple of the Holy Ghost [1 Co. 6: 19]," asked St. Paul of the Catholics in Corinth. If such can be said of the followers of Christ, what can we say of she who carried Him within her body? If the Golden Temple of Solomon, an inanimate object, was a fitting "house" for the Lord, how much more fitting was His living "house," the Mother who would bear Him, hold Him, nurse Him, carry Him, and give Him that maternal love that all Infants need so much. It is a fact unappreciated by most Catholics today that Our Lady showers this same motherly affection on her "other" children, the members of the Church founded by her Son and presented to her in the person of St. John on Calvary: Woman, behold thy son. How deep does this love of Mary for her spiritual children run? This is how Our Lady of La Salette appeared to Melanie Calvat on September 19, 1846: "I saw a most beautiful lady sitting on top of our Paradise [a small stone house built by the children], with her head in her hands She began to speak and from her beautiful eyes tears also started to flow." What a sight to contemplate the glorious Virgin in tears for a humanity that plunges itself ever deeper into spiritual turpitude and hardness of heart with each passing year! The members of the True Church are blessed indeed to have such a Mother in Heaven. We are blessed beyond description in this Woman who watches over us, who intercedes for us, who even sheds tears for us. This living Domus Aurea, "House of Gold," is a pledge of Christ's love for His Church-----Behold thy Mother! This title of hers, one of the jewels of the Litany of Loreto, is one for which we may be eternally grateful:
To subscribe, click the link above or write: THE REMNANT
HOME-----------------------VIEW THE IMAGE WITHOUT THE FRAME |
