Not everyone knows that Mary is the patron saint of the Franciscan order. But why this importance of Our Lady for the order? We will discover this through a selection of objects from the collections of the Custody of the Holy Land that will be displayed in the future historical section of the Terra Santa Museum. The museum, which will be located in the Convent of St. Saviour in Jerusalem, will be a place to rediscover the history of the Franciscans in the Holy Land and their devotion to the Mother of God. Father Stéphane Milovitch, director of the Custody's Cultural Heritage Office, and Father Alessandro Coniglio, professor at the Studium Biblicum Franciscanum in Jerusalem, will accompany us on this in-depth study. Br STÉPHANE MILOVITCH, ofm Director of the Cultural Heritage Office - Custody of the Holy Land "We are in the Sacristy of the Convent of St Saviour in Jerusalem. Today our reflection starts with this liturgical vestment, a chasuble of French manufacture, made in the second half of the 17th century. This chasuble is part of a set of liturgical vestments that also includes a stole, a maniple and a chalice veil. The chasuble is embellished with an embroidered roundel depicting Mary as the Immaculate Conception. The roundel is surrounded by a riot of flowers - the red colour recalls Christ's sacrifice - and acanthus, the symbol of the Resurrection and salvation. The image of the Immaculate Virgin shows the Marian devotion of both the Franciscans and the French: Louis XIII had chosen the Virgin as the protector of France in 1638." Br ALESSANDRO CONIGLIO, ofm Professor Studium Biblicum Franciscanum – Jerusalem "The Franciscan Order's devotion to the Immaculata and its drive to promulgate the Marian dogma are well known. From the theological reflections of Blessed John Duns Scotus, to the Militia of the Immaculate founded in 1917 by St. Maximilian Kolbe, the sons of St. Francis have always been distinguished by their love for the Immaculate Conception of the Blessed Virgin Mary. So much so that they proclaimed her, under this title, the principal Patroness of the Friars! In the writings of Francis, the expression Immaculate is never found in reference to Mary Most Holy. However, in one of his prayers, the Greeting to the Blessed Virgin Mary, the Saint of Assisi addresses her saying: "you in whom was and is every fullness of grace and every good". (FF 259). With this expression, Francis grasps the essence of the mystery of the Immaculate Conception: attributing to Mary the fullness of every good, in fact, Francis sees the Virgin filled with God Himself in a unique way. In fact, at every canonical hour, in a prayer he composed, Francis loved to call God as the "good", "every good, supreme good, all good, you alone are good" (FF 265), or, as the saint wrote in the cartula for brother Leo, "You are the good, every good, the supreme good, Lord God living and true" (FF 261). Mary in some way participates in this absolute goodness of God, because she was never touched by a shadow of sin or evil. Since her immaculate conception, Mary has been a mirror of God's purity and goodness, preserved from the contagion of guilt by the merits of Christ the Redeemer. But if being conceived without original sin is Mary's privilege, every Christian, reborn one day from the baptismal font cleansed of every stain of sin, has also known the same grace and immaculacy, as St Paul reminds us: "In [Christ, the Father] chose us before the creation of the world to be holy and blameless before him in love" (Eph 1:4); with Mary's help, every baptised person can persevere in this state of election, until they share the same lot of glory with the Virgin in Heaven." Read More