What did Jesus ask Mother Pierina to do?
God had called Mother Pierina De Micheli for a particular vocation ever since her childhood. He entrusted to her the penitential reparation of the Holy Face of His Son Jesus.
Blessed Pierina De Micheli received from God the specific vocation to live the attraction, a particular, unique fascination for the Holy Face of Jesus and to consecrate to this divine, radiant Face her life and apostolate and to draw the attention of the people of her day to the Face of Jesus. No one can satiate him/herself and even less save him/herself alone. This is why it is imperative to turn one’s gaze to the Face of the One who, for the Glory of God and in expiation for our sins, was pierced (Jn 19:37) and to cherish it within oneself.
Ever since that Good Friday in 1902, during the Adoration of the Cross, when Jesus had asked her to kiss the derided Face of the Crucified One, Giuseppina De Micheli nourished an ever deeper love of Jesus’ human-divine Face, and Jesus appeared to her and asked of her:
“I desire that my Face, which expresses the anguish of my soul, the pain and the love of my Heart,
be more honoured. Whoever contemplates me, consoles me”.
As the years passed, Jesus appeared to her at times with a sad Face, a blood-stained Face, and he asked her for “reparation”. Thus, she felt an ever stronger desire to suffer and to immolate herself for the salvation of souls.
On Shrove Tuesday, Jesus came and said: “Every time that my Face is contemplated, I shall spread my love in hearts and through my Holy Face, the salvation of many souls will be obtained”.
Prayer to the Holy Face
O! Holy Face of my sweet Jesus,
through the tender love
and the painful palpitation
with which Mary Most Holy contemplated Thee
in Thy excruciating Passion
Conceed that our souls
may share in such deep love
and such great pain
and fulfil as perfectly as possible
the Most Holy Will of God.
Amen.
THE MEDAL
In May 1938, while Mother Pierina knelt in prayer, the Most Holy Virgin appeared on the altar, bearing in her hands a scapular made of two small pieces of white flannel. One bore the image of the Holy Face of Jesus with the phrase: “Ilumina Domine Vultum Tuum super nos” and the other, a Host, emanating rays, with the words: “Mane nobiscum Domine”.
Promise
Mother Pierina succeeded, after many difficulties, in having the medal struck according to the Most Holy Virgin’s instructions. The Virgin had told her that anyone who wore the medal and visited the Most Holy Sacrament every Tuesday, with the intention of repenting for all the outrage perpetrated against the Holy Face:
- will be strengthened in the faith,
- will overcome internal and external difficulties,
- will die in peace under the gaze of Her Divine Son