In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.
The life of Blessed Inés de Benigánim is a life full of wonders.
The natural and the supernatural intermingle in it with all normality.
Her permanent relationship with Jesus, with the Virgin Mary, with the saints and the angels,
make her life a heaven on earth; with the difference that in heaven there is no suffering,
everything is happiness, and she had to suffer many illnesses and hardships to win souls for God.
Her relationship with her guardian angel, and in general with angels, was something
daily for her.
She was very concerned about the salvation of sinners and especially the dying, many
of whom she personally assisted in their last moments.
She also continually prayed for the souls in purgatory and many of them came to her
cell to spend their purgatory with the permission of the Lord.
Her relationship with Jesus was so friendly and easy that sometimes they played like little children.
She had no malice, she did not know the things of the world and she was so innocent that
she believed everything, even though her sisters told her the most absurd things.
But in spiritually she was a giant of the spirit and she prayed and suffered as a brave
woman who knew that God made the salvation of many souls depend on her.
For this, the Lord granted her some supernatural gifts such as the gift of bilocation, supernatural
knowledge, prophecy, healing and miracles.
When our Blessed Inés de Benigánim was born in 1625, the Church was governed by Pope Urban
VIII from the year 1623 to 1644, and in Spain, by King Philip IV, under whose rule Spain
would gradually lose prestige and power.
However, along with the material and economic decline of the country, there is a spiritual flourishing.
New religious Institutes are born and saints and writers on religious themes flourish.
The Discalced Augustinians of Benigánim, to whose convent the Servant of God belonged,
had Saint Augustine of Hippo, the great doctor of the Church, as their father, but they also
considered Saint Juan de Ribera as their father, who was Archbishop of Valencia and the true
founder of this Augustinian branch of the Discalced Augustinians.
Blessed Inés de Benigánim, frequently appearing by bilocation in different places, made her
presence felt by a heavenly fragrance or supernatural perfume.
In Valencia, a young woman who had become pregnant without being married, decided to
drown her child as soon as it was born to avoid comments.
But the delivery was so difficult that she was already at death's door.
A friend of the Servant of God invoked the Virgin and asked for the help of Blessed Inés de Benigánim.
At that moment, those who attended smelled a special fragrance in the room and everything
was resolved favorably.
The servant of God, speaking after with the one who had invoked her, said
"I could not fail,
had I not told you that, whenever you call me, I will come, God willing?"
You should know that my angel tells me when you call me.
Tell that young lady to take care of her soul and give thanks to God.
Father Tosca stated
I heard Father Pantoix mention that, one day while talking with the
venerable Mother, he perceived a strange fragrance that he did not find similar to anything on
earth to be able to compare it.
He asked Blessed Inés what that fragrance was
and she replied
"Father, not everyone
perceives it, it belongs to some blessed souls who have recently passed through the convent."
Father Joseph, in the funeral prayer of Blessed Inés de Benigánim said
her virginal body
gave off a heavenly smell that many perceived without being able to find flowers with which
to compare it.
And it was from her purity that, like tuberose, gave off its fragrance.
Two hours before Blessed Inés de Benigánim died, when she was visited by the Virgin Mary,
Saint Joseph and other saints, as she communicated to her confessor, she perceived in her cell
and in the whole convent a fragrance superior to that of all the other flowers of the world.
And the same thing happened with her remains after her death.
The assistance to the dying was one of the special charisms of our Blessed Inés de Benigánim.
God frequently sent her to assist the dying to help them in those difficult moments.
She was calm, well accompanied by her guardian angel.
Her confessor father Philip tells us
Mother Inés applied herself so much with her fiery
charity to assist and help the dying that, according to her, there were few days when
she did not exercise this charitable office.
She was already going to Italy, to Castile, to one kingdom or another, to this or that place.
One day during the feast of the Immaculate Conception of Mary, she was secluded in her
cell and, between eight and nine at night, an angel appeared to her in the form of
a bizarre young man who said he was the guardian angel of a man who was dying and who was sent
by God to accompany her to where the sick person was.
The angel took Blessed Inés de Benigánim to a very large place in Castile and the Servant
of God entered the room where the dying man was, who was a very old man.
Many were the demons that afflicted him.
Our Lord Jesus Christ gave knowledge to Blessed Inés de Benigánim of the afflictions of
this poor man.
She took on a burden for the poor man, offering herself to suffer what our sweet Jesus wanted
to send her, and, being in these prayers, the Archangel Saint Michael and Saint Peter the Apostle
assisted Blessed Inés de Benigánim.
At that moment, the demons disappeared, giving horrific roars.
The apostle Saint Peter gave the poor man his blessing, the man died; and the archangel
Saint Michael and the blessed guardian angel of the man put his soul in purgatory.
Another day she went to a very distant place where she found a dying man named John, who,
because he had been a businessman and made many deals, the wicked enemies fiercely fought
him, with their lies making it impossible to save him.
But with the majestic assistance of our Lord Jesus Christ, accompanied by His Most Blessed
Mother, the Patriarch Saint Joseph, the two Johns, the Baptist and the Evangelist,
Saint Gaetano dei Conti di Thiene also known as Saint Cajetan and others who interceded for the man,
and by the devout prayers of His servant Inés, the Divine Majesty used these
with him by mercy, giving him help to perform perfect acts of love.
The man having died in grace, his soul went to purify itself in purgatory.
Blessed Inés de Benigánim also went to assist a virtuous maiden who was in the last moments
of her life.
The Lord favored her, positioned on His majestic throne, assisted by His Virgin Mother, by
the patriarchs Saint Joseph, Saint Dominic and other saints.
The enemies that were in the room were very many; and as the maiden was in the flower
of her age, this was disturbing to her, proposing to her, without a doubt, that she should fail
in her resignation.
The Servant of God, knowing that the demons were exceedingly excessive in disturbing her,
she told them
"Go to hell, this soul belongs to my husband Jesus, and run."
With this they left desperate.
The maiden died and the Lord granted her to go to suffer purgatory in the cell of His
servant Inés, which lasted a few days.
Another day, while Blessed Inés de Benigánim was in prayer, an angel appeared to her, telling
her that God had sent him to go with her to assist a man who was dying.
She, accompanied by that angel and her guardian angel, was taken in an instant to a place
far away from her.
She entered the room where the dying man was, and she saw in it a great multitude of demons,
which disturbed and afflicted the dying man with such horrendous figures, that just seeing
them was enough to cause death.
They showed her some big books, telling her how his bad life was written in them; and
that in this way she did not have to tire of asking God for forgiveness, nor trusting
in His mercy; for he had no remedy, since he was already written in the number of the damned.
Blessed Inés de Benigánim was greatly consoled seeing that our Lord Jesus Christ went down
to assist that poor man, accompanied by His Most Blessed Mother, the Archangel Saint Michael
and other saints who interceded for him, encouraging him to make acts of faith, hope and charity,
and with great sorrow for having offended his Creator, he asked Him for mercy.
The Lord manifested to His servant Inés the state in which that man was found,
making her clearly aware of the concerns, anguish and afflictions that he suffered
and with great charity and great yield Blessed Ines said to Jesus
“Husband and owner of mine,
since You have wanted to bring me here and show me the agonies and hidden needs of this
my neighbor, admit this burden, which I do for him with all my heart; to come upon me
as much as Your divine Majesty will like that this Your unworthy slave suffer, that I offer myself to everything.
Sorrows come, just don't lose this soul ". While in these prayers, the Lord showed Blessed
Ines a large pool of water, in which there were twelve wheels of fire, which continually rolled.
The man died and the Lord commanded his guardian angel to put that soul in that pool of water,
so he would suffer purgatory.
And the infernal enemies seeing that they failed, they went away raging.
Blessed Inés de Benigánim begged her divine husband to deign to clarify what that pool
with the twelve wheels meant, where that soul was purged.
And her divine Majesty told her
“Daughter, living this man has done some good works;
but with great lukewarmness.
He lived and behaved very coldly regarding the inspirations and knowledge that I communicated
to him; and therefore he suffers purgatory in that pool of water.
Those wheels being in continuous movement signifies the little stability that he had.
He undertook a work of virtue, and then he left it, he began an exercise of mortification,
and instantly he got tired,
he had no persistence in the works of perfection.
Being twelve in number the wheels of fire, and throwing sparks towards the soul
it is because he occupied his thoughts in things that did not matter
he forgot on twelve occasions
to fulfill the penance that the confessor imposed on him.
In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.