Father Lorenzo Sales
Sister Maria Consolata Betrone was a mystic favoured by locutions and, perhaps, by visions of Jesus. She reported it precisely in her diary, carefully examined by Father Lorenzo Sales, Consolata Missionary, at first sceptical and unsure, then in his turn divulger of the Work of the Lord.
"Humble and great, active and contemplative, serene and tormented, suffering and full of joy, Consolata led a linear life reconciling each differing thing in herself and unifying everything in the ardent love of God. Long and intensely tempted herself, she had a delicate understanding of sinners, especially for consecrated souls who had transgressed, and for their conversion she offered God all her suffering and pain and finished by offering life itself". This Poor Clare nun was presented in these words in the statement which introduced the beatification process. Here is revealed a spirituality of atonement perfectly in harmony with that desire for penitence which inspired the beginnings of her vocation. A mystic is always inserted in the context of his or her historical times and by it is inspired and "sent" by God. He is a sort of "prophet" open to the spiritual needs of her contemporary humanity and in the same way offers himself with Christ to the Father.
In the heart of a century dedicated to sin, to atheism and, finally, religious indifference, the message of life and prayer of Sister Consolata Betrone stands out with obvious clarity as reparation and antidote to the culture of spiritual death of man. The Tiny Path of Love given in the prayer: Jesus, Mary, I love you, save souls, is not only a brief prayer, rather an interior way able to educate and promote a greater confidence between man and his God in the knowledge and faith full of that great divine attribute that is Compassion. Through this very simple way, the soul is newly returned to vital communion with the Most High in the true capacity of its own contemplative dimension. Consolata Betrone was not alone in this tracing of the return route of the "prodigal son" , XX century man, to a Father rich in Compassion. The broad Divine plan seem to have significantly interwoven her human and mystic existence with those of two of her "distant" contemporaries: Sister Maria Faustina Kowalska (1905-1938) and the monk Silvanus of Mount Athos (1866-1938). The common denominator of all is Thérèse of Lisieux (1873-1897).
In the culture of making and having, reproposing the evangelical need "to pray continually and never lose heart" (Lk 18,1), the message sent to us by Sister Consolata assumes the importance of a gospel for our time. A gospel of love, of hope and compassion for the years of hate, desperation and distance from God. God offers the remedy of spiritual breath to man suffocated by materialism. A contemporary "Clare" again announces the need for the primacy of God in the heart of man.