AUGUST 5. Alexandrina maria da costa, victim soul
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Patron saint of youth and penitent women
Lived 1904-1955 Beatified 2004 Canonization pending "O my Jesus, I want to suffer all! I want to be crushed by you! I am your victim . . . but do not punish the world. I want to be the lightning conductor of your wrath." - Alexandrina Maria da Costa Alexandrina Maria da Costa was a Portuguese mystic and victim soul. A victim soul is someone who God handpicks to suffer more than other humans; to be a victim soul you must "generously accept" what you're chosen for. As a destitute girl-child, Alexandrina scrimped to buy her own plaster virgin. She adored her figurine, and, in time, the statuette was "almost kissed smooth." When Alexandrina was 14, her employer and two other men entered her home with the aim of violating her chastity; like Maria Goretti, her tormentors crashed in on her sewing. In an effort to save her virginity, Alexandrina jumped from her window and fell 13 feet, paralyzing herself forever. For five years, Alexandrina would amaze parishioners by "dragging herself" to church to pray. Her condition worsened, and by one account her experience was "tantamount to being buried alive." Alexandrina--now bedridden--and her family "assaulted heaven" and bargained with the Virgin for a cure. Alexandrina promised to dress in funereal garb and shear her hair in order to walk again. She asked of the Virgin:"Place me near the tabernacle of Jesus in order that I can serve as a lamp as long as the world lasts."God did not honor her pleas, though every movement ailed her. God instead "helped her to see that suffering was her vocation" and she had a "special calling to be the Lord's victim." He said to her, "My daughter, suffering is the key to heaven." She said of her original request for a cure: "Our Lady has given me an even greater grace: first abandonment, then complete conformity to God's will, and finally, the thirst for suffering." CRUCIFIED BY CHRIST In ecstasies, Alexandrina relived Christ's passion 180 times. The first time, Christ invited her to consecrate her body to him. He then crucified her, saying "Give me your hands, because I want to nail them with mine. Give me your feet, because I want to nail them to my feet. Give me your head, because I want to crown it with thorns as they did to me. Give me your heart, because I want to pierce it with a lance as they did mine." Hours of increasing dread, fear, and immense sadness preceded each vision. In ecstasies, she recovered the use of her paralyzed limbs. An eyewitness report: "Oh how everything was reproduced in that frail body of Alexandrina! [. . .] In my opinion, her agony intensified when she presented her little white hands and then her feet to be nailed." Each ecstasy lasted three and a half hours. If you're interested, you can read a blow-by-blow account of her torment. A WAFER A DAY KEEPS THE DEVIL AWAY On Good Friday in 1942, Alexandrina heard Christ say "You will not take food again on this earth. Your food will be my Flesh; your blood will be my Divine Blood; your life will be my Life." Thus began a 13 year fast. That is one year--coincidentally?--for every foot that she fell. For these 13 years, she survived only on a wafer of Eucharist a day washed down with a swig of Christ's blood. Doctors observed her at length, noting that her condition could not be explained through scientific data. A nutritional analysis of communion yields that the wafer contains approximately 0.88 calories, and a sip of wine contains 12 calories. By this analysis, it would take approximately 180,000 hosts (or 490+ years of daily Eucharist) to eat the whole of Christ's body. This means that Alexandrina consumed around 1/38th of Christ's total person over the course of her fast. Apparently "one Christ's worth of hosts works out to 158,400 calories of bread and 3,480 calories of wine." The internet advises that bedridden people get at least 1200 calories a day. Alexandrina consumed a 100th of that. POSSESSOR OF MULTIPLE EYES Alexandrina claimed that she possessed and saw through a trio of eye types: (1) "the eyes of an earthly person" (2) "the interior eyes of the soul" (3) "other eyes, and not even eyes of the spirit, [heart, or mind]. It is like a clear light that sees and understands everything." SIN HAS A SMELL Like Christina the Astonishing, Alexandrina was overcome by the appalling smell of sin. Violets and perfumes were powerless against the same vile smell that tortured her. DEATH Alexandrina's death coincided with the 38th anniversary of the final appearance of Our Lady of Fatima, which occurred on 13 October 1917. |