Saturday 19 September 2015

Mary In Her Scapular Promise

Read about the Redemptorist Sisters of St. Joseph who make and supply our scapulars, here. Please help enable them to produce and send many more scapulars to the Catholic missions.

The Scapular Promise of Our Lady is: "Whosoever dies clothed in this shall never suffer eternal fire". Pope Pius IX said, "this extraordinary gift of the Scapular brings its great usefulness not only to the Carmelite Family of Mary but also to all the rest of the faithful who wish, affiliated to that Family, to follow Mary with a very special devotion".

The book contains 15 chapters, including, The Origin of the PromiseMeaning of the PromiseHistoricity of the PromiseHow the Promise is KeptScapular Prayer and Communication of Benefits, and much more.

This is the most complete book on the subject we have seen. It gives many examples of the powerful protection one gets from the Scapular and that protection is in great need today.


A priest in the African mission fields who distributes scapulars sent by the Sisters of St. Joseph writes:

"The scapulars will be much appreciated in Lesotho. I just gave out all the ones that I still had from Sister. One of her scapulars was part of the most beautiful sick call I have ever made as a priest.

After Mass on Monday I was asked to visit a sick boy in the village of Adelina. He is eighteen years old and has been sick for the last three years. He cannot even stretch out his arms fully. He went to a public hospital and instead of an operation, he received a wheelchair.

The faithful wished to come with me and so an older lady, a few young men and many children formed a crowd with me that walked through a number of scattered small stone houses which I had never seen before. It reminded me of the crowds that escorted Our Lord.

I gave a blessing for the sick boy and then one of the faithful handed me one of the scapulars that I had handed out on the day before, asking me to give it to the boy. I had to instruct the boy about the meaning and history of the scapular and he wished to receive it. But since I did not bring the correct prayer, I asked a sixteen year old boy, who is Anglican but now wants to be received into the Church and to learn how to serve Mass, to run to get it from my nephew at the Adelina chapel.

Meanwhile the faithful prayed three decades of the rosary for the sick boy, which moved him to small tears which he repeatedly brushed off his eyes while in bed. The prayer book arrived and then I enrolled him in the brown scapular. Then the faithful began to sing a hymn to Our Lady in Sesotho as we left the very small room. The boy's mother thanked me as I left.

So, Sister's scapulars are going to some good souls, this one who never was seen at the chapel, though his father came for the first time on Sunday".