Although I didn’t realise it until much later, Mary had taken me under her wing almost from the moment of my birth. I was born very premature when my twin died in the womb and it was thought I, too, had died. But a nurse passing by noticed a tiny twitch of life and baptised me there and then, giving me the name of Mary. I learned much later from my aunt that the nurse was, of course, Catholic, so I had been Catholic almost from birth. It was eighteen years later that I was received into the Church from being brought up as Church of England.
Shortly after I was received, I came across a biography of Sr Elizabeth of the Trinity, as she was then, and discovered her writings – at that time only in French, so I had to use my schoolgirl French to read her. Then I read the autobiography of St Therese of Lisieux and a biography of St Teresa of Avila, discovered St John of the Cross and all this led me to becoming a member of the Carmelite family. In Carmel I found my spiritual family and this led me to a deep love of Carmelite spirituality. St Elizabeth is still my spiritual guide. I love her sayings, ‘I have found heaven on earth since heaven is God and God is in my soul’. ‘I have within me the prayer of Jesus’; She points me to the Blessed Trinity as the goal of my spiritual life. As well, I have seen beneath her often flowery language to appreciate the solid teaching of St Therese.
My newest discovery among our Carmelite saints is St Teresa of Los Andes with her great love of the Eucharist. It was Jesus’s words on the Eucharist which began, when I was twelve years old and receiving communion for the first time after my confirmation, that my search began for the Church which taught unequivocally that Jesus was really and truly present in the Sacred Host.
All this time, I had the non-Catholic concern about what is perceived as Catholic excesses in devotion to Mary; it was some ten years later after I was received into the Church , while I was doing the washing – a very homely setting! – that thinking about Mary, I could see her place in Scripture, both Old- and New- Testaments.-This was very important to me as, from my non-Catholic days I had a great love of Scripture. I now knew Mary to be truly my mother, who had being guiding me all these years without my knowing it, into her Order of Carmelites and into the Catholic Church.
She now had to show me how to pray her precious gift to us of the rosary. I could see how it was an excellent prayer, taking us through the lives of Jesus and Mary, from the Annunciation to Mary’s crowning as queen in heaven. I could see how it engaged our minds, our imagination, our bodies, as we counted the beads and how it was an excellent prayer of intercession. It ensured that we carved out a set period for prayer but it left me cold until I went on a pilgrimage to Walsingham. As we prayed the rosary along the Holy Mile, I reflected on how saturated with prayer those peaceful were meadows that we passed. I then reflected that, if I prayed the rosary as I went down to the High Street to shop, for example, I could pray for the people in their houses, those I passed by the way. I found little niches in the day when I could pray a decade or a rosary, and this became one, then two, then three and four rosaries. I then made a resolution to pray four rosaries every day, which I have continued to do, even in the busiest of days. This is now my prayer of choice and wonderful vistas of understanding have opened up to me as I enter into the lives of Jesus and Mary every day.
Looking back I see how Mary has been gently guiding me almost from birth, even when I didn’t know her. My love for her has grown ever deeper and she has been showing me Jesus ever more profoundly, who I love more and more, day by day. This is my hope, that surrounded by my Carmelite family, praying the rosary as Our Lady has requested, growing in union with Jesus, which is leading me into the family life of the Trinity, that I shall one day be privileged to enjoy the full vision of my beloved Jesus, face to face, and see my mother Mary, too, in the depths of the Most Holy Trinity. .
Jennifer Moorcroft T.O.C
