The Revelations of St Bridget of Sweden is a large work of the private revelations to said saint. Born in 1303, she married young and had eight children but she was also widowed relatively young, her husband passing away in around the year 1344.
Soon after that, God gave her the mission of founding a new religious order. She was a mystic and received many messages from Our Lord and Our Lady, and occasionally other saints including St Peter, St John and St Francis of Assisi.
Towards the end of her life, she made a pilgrimage to the Holy Land. She died in Rome on 23 July 1373.
This work is organized into 12 books containing short chapters. Depending on the source, not all chapters are available in English.
Book I: 60 chapters.
Book II: 30 chapters.
Book III: 34 chapters.
Book IV: 144 chapters.
Book V, also called “The Book of Questions”: 16 “Interrogations” & 13 “Revelations”.
Book VI: 93 chapters. (?)
Book VII: 31 chapters.
Book VIII: 56 chapters. (?)
Book IX: 49 chapters. (?)
Book X: (?)
Book XI: 21 Readings, three for each day of the week starting from Sunday.
Book XII: 4 Prayers revealed by God in praise of Jesus Christ and the Virgin Mary.
The content of these revelations or messages will generally come across as typical to those familiar with the works of mystics.
These include the importance of prayer, the Sacraments, loving God for His own sake, remembering and meditating on the Passion, and details regarding the life of Our Lord and Our Lady, including the Passion.
There are no few calls to repentance and warnings of Hell or at least Purgatory, particularly for priests and bishops given their grave responsibilities. There are chapters advising how clergy should live and fulfil their roles. Despite His sternness, Our Lord always finishes with a reminder that He is merciful and would meet anyone who makes the effort to turn to Him.
Many revelations are deliberately metaphoric or figurative although an explanation is always given.
Below is an excerpt, merely two paragraphs, from Book I, Chapter 10 in which the Blessed Virgin Mary tells St Bridget about how she aimed to please God in all things and what she thought after His birth. She also revealed, amongst other things, though not reproduced below, what she saw during the Passion of Our Lord.
Nothing but God was pleasing to me. I always hoped in my heart to live until the time of his birth and perhaps merit becoming the unworthy handmaid of the Mother of God. I also made a vow in my heart to preserve my virginity, if that was acceptable to him, and to possess nothing whatsoever in the world. But if God willed otherwise, my wish was that his will, not mine, be done, for I believed he was able to do all things and wanted nothing but the best for me. And so I entrusted all my will to him. When the prescribed time arrived for the presentation of virgins in the temple of the Lord, I was also present with them thanks to the religious compliance of my parents. I thought to myself that nothing was impossible for God, and that, since he knew I desired nothing and wanted nothing but him, he would be able to preserve my virginity, if it so pleased him: otherwise, let his will be done!
…
Just as he entered my limbs to the joy of all my soul, so to the joy of all my limbs he left me, with my soul rejoicing and my virginity unscathed. When I looked upon him and contemplated his beauty, knowing myself to be unworthy of such a son, joy seeped through my soul like drops of dew. When I contemplated the places where, as I had learned through the prophets, his hands and feet would be nailed at the crucifixion, my eyes filled with tears and my heart was torn by sadness. My Son looked at my crying eyes then and became deathly saddened. When I contemplated his divine power, I was consoled again, realizing that this was the way he wanted it and so it was the right way, and I conformed all my will to his. So my joy was always mixed with sorrow.
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