While Marguerite considered this to be "the occasion of the greatest miracle ever performed in this world," she stressed that this was the first visit Mary made after the Annunciation.23 Thus, Marguerite did not perceive the Visitation event as one moment in Mary's life. Rather, this Lucan narrative captured for her the whole of Mary's life centered in God and turned towards her neighbor.
Behind Marguerite's reading of the Lucan narrative is a favorite expression found in seventeenth-century spirituality, Mary's "journeying life, in conversation with her neighbor." In the seventeenth century, "the French word converser that we translate as 'conversation' was close to its Latin root word, meaning 'to live with.' It carried the sense of its verb form, that is, 'to turn again and again towards one's neighbour; to be attentive to one's neighbour as a person'."24 Cardinal Berulle, a seventeenth-century theologian, used this expression to capture the essence of Jesus' life on earth. "Jesus," he wrote, "through his Incarnation, his journeying life on earth, especially in his public life, passion and death on the Cross, initiated a new conversation between God and humankind."25 In so doing, Jesus was always turned toward his neighbor in conversation, looking beyond appearances to the inner heart of the person, responding to his/her needs: healing, affirming, calling to conversion as the situation required.
For Berulle, Mary, intimately connected to the whole of Jesus' journeying life--his life in conversation with his neighbor, his teachings, his passion, death and resurrection--had developed the same mind and heart of Jesus. (cf. Eph. 3:14-21; Phil. 2:1-11) For this reason, he urged Christians to learn from Mary how to love, to follow Jesus, and to imitate his virtues in their lives according to their personal gifts and the circumstances in which they lived.26
That Marguerite and her companions would learn how to follow Jesus from Mary is clear in her writings. "To discover how to imitate Mary," and by implication Jesus, she writes, "we ought to go through her life and stop at whatever Our Lord inspires us to do."27 Marguerite provides us with reflections on the scriptural memory of Mary, always drawing comparisons between her life and that of the Congregation called, like Mary, to live in the spirit of the Visitation, always attentive to God and turned towards their neighbor. In summary, Marguerite called herself and her Congregation to the same attentiveness and openness to God that Mary showed in her life; accompanied by wonder and admiration of God who, as in Mary, does great things in every person. (Lk. 1:26-56)28
In her reflections on the gospel narratives of the magi's (Mt 2: 1-14) and the shepherds' visits to Jesus (Lk. 2:8-20), Marguerite perceived Mary receiving rich and poor people with the same love. In the marriage at Cana, Marguerite moved beyond theology. For her, Mary's presence was due to the fact that "they were poor people and there was a work of charity to do."29 Marguerite, in her turn, exemplified this attitude towards people in her own life and encouraged her sisters to do likewise.30
There are many other examples. Perhaps they are best captured in her insistence on devotion to the Presence of God and to the Passion. "The Blessed Virgin," she wrote, "followed her Son to the foot of the cross. The sisters must live always in the presence of God, as a mother who loves her child passionately does not lose him from her sight."31 Since the Blessed Virgin "experienced all the pain and all the sufferings which her Divine Son bore during His passion," Marguerite encouraged the sisters to meditate often on the sufferings of Christ.32
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