Nossa Senhora (Maria Santíssima, Virgem Maria, Mariologia, Mãe de Jesus, Santa Maria)
       SUPLEMENTO: Revelações privadas de videntes católicos sobre Nossa Senhora (Não reconhecidas oficialmente pela Igreja)
             Revelação da vidente Maria Valtorta sobre Nossa Senhora

 Características físicas (aparência) de Nossa Senhora

^{[Maria Valtorta says:]} At supper time — that is, from 8 to 9 p.m. — when I had been left alone, my mental sight was beatified by the vision of Holy Mary. I will try to describe Her to you ^{[Father Migliorini]}. But how can I manage to show you her beauty and the colors She had?
She is dressed in white: a dress closed at the base of the neck, as if it were curled, for I see that over her breast the cloth forms soft folds which chastely follow Mary’s figure. The sleeves are rather narrow and long, down to her wrists. At her waist a belt gathers in her dress. But it is not golden or silver. It seems to be a silken cord, the same as the dress in color and luster.
It has no bows, but falls down over the dress. It encircles it, and that’s all.
Over her head, a mantle of the same cloth as the dress, light, but not veiling Her. It descends over Mary’s cheeks and approaches her neck, as if it were held back by a clasp. A long clasp, though, for I see Mary’s extremely white throat. In short, it is supported at her shoulders and descends along the upper part of her arms and her side down to the ground.
But how can I describe for you the splendor of that very white and simple dress? Snow is gray and opaque; the lily is still less beautiful. Its whiteness shines so brightly that it resembles silver turned into cloth. Oh, words are impotent to describe the light! Only in Heaven — and to robe Mary — can there be such cloth of a phosphorescent, diamond-like, pearly, opaline whiteness which is a gem without being a gem or resulting from the union of gems so as to shine that way!
I see the rather round oval of Mary’s face. Of a shade of ivory like certain magnolia petals, the same color as that of her Son’s face, though shaped differently from his, which is longer and thinner. On this flowery face only the thin lips and eyebrows, slightly dark, provide color.
The eyes, not wide open, but seeds veiled by her eyelids, have the same gaze as her Son’s and are of the same skyblue as Jesus’, but paler. To continue with human comparisons, I might say that Jesus’ eyes are sapphire, and Mary’s, turquoise. Jesus’ serious, saddened look is in Mary a sadness joined, however, to a smile: the good smile of someone who is afflicted, but wants to console and exhort at the same time.
Her hair is the color of ripe wheat, or pure gold, if you prefer, always tending towards reddish blond, but more blond than red, whereas in Jesus there is a tendency towards a coppery blond.
Her long, thin hands, with very long and tapering fingers, emerge from the tight sleeves, with their delicate, very white wrists. They are two magnolia petals joined in prayer. They so resemble budding flowers that it seems to me they must smell of flowers.
No necklace, none at all. It is all of Mary which is a Gem with the luminosity of alabaster, or, better, of opal inwardly illuminated by a flame. Her glorified body emits light, a very gentle light which really makes me think of a lamp burning before the Tabernacle: a lamp of white alabaster or, I repeat, of opal.
I do not see her feet because the dress is so long that it covers them.
That’s my description of our Mother for you.
She kept and keeps me company, and it strikes me that everything around me is becoming luminous and virginal, and light and purity descend into my heart and, along with them, a joy that makes me weep with blessedness.
I believe that if Mary said a single word, my soul would swoon in ecstasy, for only a thread keeps me from sinking into it, and this is only so I can see the Blessed One and feel kissed by her smile and her look.
It is now evening, and I say to Jesus, "Lord, won’t you say something today?"
He replies that my lesson today is being given me by Mary and that the contemplation of Her does not require other words. Indeed, just seeing Her teaches the beauty of purity, of prayer, and of silence. Three great things very little and poorly practiced.

  Vide também Vida e Obra de Maria Valtorta

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Nota sobre a fonte: Maria Valtorta foi uma mística católica italiana. Durante sua vida, ela foi agraciada com revelações de Jesus Cristo sobre o Evangelho, e também de Nossa Senhora, do Espírito Santo e de vários santos e anjos.

^{[Maria Valtorta says:]} Mary Most Holy, who had filled this month of December with Herself, always present (She alone from the 8th on, Entirely Lovely, the Lily of Paradise, in her appearance as Mary Immaculate, indescribable Light which is flesh possessing the immaterial — no, not immaterial, for it is a real body — or, rather, the transfigured, ideal beauty of glorified bodies), descended today, the feast of the Holy Innocents, from her niche of light (the light emanating from her blessed body) and became Mary of Nazareth, the pure, lovely, delicate, motherly, humble Mary who lived in Palestine twenty centuries ago.
She came to my bedside, dressed in white, with a light linen veil of thin-woven cloth over her blond hair, parted at the top of her head, just as I had seen her so many times in the visions…. She was gentle, but slightly sad. Resting her very lovely hands on the edge of my bed, though, she said:
"I am here. So that you can contemplate me, study my features, from very close up, once again, and grasp where the difference lies between what I was like on earth and what I am now like in Heaven.
"In Lourdes, in Fatima, and in the apparitions in general, I appear as I am now in Heaven, and my appearance already possesses the indescribable luminous beauty of glorified bodies. The beauty which the seers of those apparitions never grasp entirely, in all its details. Note that they are able to mention the clothing I wear, the rosary I hold, the rock or tree where I stand, the gestures I make, and the expression on my face, but they are always uncertain — and, involuntarily, they are never truthful — about describing my face and the color of my eyes and hair and skin. They make an effort to do so. But they do manage to; they cannot do so.
"None of the souls of the seers has seen me to the extent that you have seen me, as a Girl, Spouse, and Mother on earth and as the Queen of Heaven. And every time you say to yourself, ‘It is still Her. But how different She is as the glorious Queen of Heaven, taken up in body and soul among the angels, from the times when She is the humble Mary of Nazareth.’
"Look at me carefully, daughter, and soothe your pain. Look at me. Am I Mary of Nazareth?"
^{[Maria Valtorta says:]} I observed her carefully, close as she was to my face. I examined her skin, of a warm magnolia paleness suffused with a tenuous pink on her cheeks, her appropriately distended red lips, her thin, straight nose, her perfectly proportioned, clear skyblue eyes under her lofty, smooth brow, the perfect oval face of a girl…. I don’t know why her face always makes me think of a white flame or a lily bud about to open — the curves are so gentle in their oval…. I looked at her beautiful mildly blond hair — fine, soft, and slightly wavy. I considered that if, instead of being clasped into heavy braids extending over her head, they were hanging loose, the waviness would have been more marked…. And, above all, I got lost perceiving the tenuous color of her body breathing close to me and her fragrance — her characteristic scent, the smell of Mary, the smell of the Virgin….
Mary read my wish to abandon myself on her motherly shoulder to obtain relief in so many afflictions of every kind and drew to herself. I remained like that — I don’t know for how long.
She then left me, saying, "Write that I have clasped you to my heart.’ I wrote this last five lines.
She then said, "And now look at me." She became transfigured, rising from the ground, separating herself from my bed, supported by a silver cloud bathed in her extremely white light. Her body shone and her robe, turning from white to "white light," shone. Her face shone, growing sharper, as if the light were spiritualizing it. Her enraptured gaze shone. The light was so bright that the pale blue of her eyes became a "ray," and the gold of her hair was almost no longer distinguishable as such — it seemed dark in comparison to the light emitted by the glorified Body of the Mother of God.
She lowered her eyes towards me and smiled, asking, "Is it me?"
"Yes."
"But am I the same as the woman who was Jesus’ Mother?"
"Yes…and no," I answered intrepidly, for intrepidity is needed to make certain comparisons and confessions.
"And yet it’s me. You see. I am like this in Heaven. I appeared like this in Lourdes and Fatima.
Where the seers saw me most clearly, since they were innocent, like you, my daughter. The more innocent creatures are, the more they see me as I am and describe me exactly, insofar as they can as creatures, and have my likeness sculpted, insofar as an image can resemble me."
She came back to me, in human form…. She asked, "Is your torment being calmed?" I wept. She caressed me. I cried because since I had read that she had appeared to Bruno Cornacchiola [The seer of the "Three Fountains."] (I now know his name) with dark hair of an oriental type, I had thought I was deceived in saying Mary was blond. And yet she is. A pale blond, moreover, nearly strawcolored, almost pure gold. I was seeing it clearly. She was here, with her head less than thirty centimeters away from my eyes! She caressed me to console me and said:
"O Maria, do not be afraid. The shadow of the grotto and the mantle greatly contributed to the mistake. And it was not necessary for me to reveal myself perfectly to a sinner, as with the innocent Bernarda, Lucy, Hyacinth, Francis, and the little John of my Jesus ^{[Jesus affectionately calls Maria Valtorta little John, in reference to the apostle John]}. "But listen carefully. To you, that are a Servant of Mary,[A Tertiary of the Order of the Servants of Mary] I say that the craftsman who sculpted me in such a way that I do not recognize myself would have done well to recall the statues of Lourdes and Fatima, where I am depicted insofar as man can depict the image of the Mother of God…. And, above all, he should have drawn inspiration from the face with which I am portrayed at Our Lady of the Annunciation in Florence[The celebrated fresco, attributed to an angelic intervention, is found in the Basilica of Our Lady of the Annunciation in Florence. The mortal remains of Maria Valtorta have been resting in the adjoining cloister since 1973] — the face from which, if man and time had not altered the image, everyone could discern what I was like when the Spirit of God rendered me pregnant with God. The smoke from candles and time have darkened the colors, and men have done damage…. But one can still see what God’s Girl, Joseph’s Betrothed, was like in that springtime of her years, in that blooming Nazarene springtime.

^{[Maria Valtorta describes the vision of the newborn Our Lady:]} It is Mary, the Mother. A very tiny Mary, who could sleep in the arms of a child, a Mary as long, at most, as an arm, with a little head of ivory dyed pale pink. Her tiny car mine lips no longer cry but are set in the instinctive act of sucking: they are so small that one cannot understand how they will be able to take a teat. Her pretty little nose is between two tiny round cheeks, and when they get Her to open Her eyes, by teasing Her, they see two small parts of the sky, two innocent blue points that look but cannot see, between thin fair eyelashes. Also Her hair on Her little round head is a pinkish blond, like the colour of certain honeys which are almost white.

^{[Maria Valtorta's vision of Our Lady's childhood:]} A little Mary comes forwards from the shady pergola: She is already quick and independent. ^[...] She looks like a little angel: Her hair is silky and honey-blonde, not very curly but gracefully wavy ending in curls: Her eyes are sky blue, Her sweet little face is rosy and smiling.

^{[Maria Valtorta's vision of Joseph and Mary:]} The waggon is not covered now by the tent, which was removed before reaching the village, both because the sun was no longer annoying them and to enable Mary to see Her native land. Mary thus appears in all the beauty of a lovely flower. White and blonde like an angel, She smiles lovingly at everybody: at the children who throw Her flowers and kisses; at the girls of Her own age who call Her by name; at the elderly women who bless Her with their cheerful voices.
She bows to the men and particularly to one who is perhaps the rabbi or the elder of the town.

^{[Maria Valtorta describes her vision of Our Lady:]} She is all dressed in white, in white linen, because it is very warm, notwithstanding that the freshness, still intact, of the flowers makes me understand that it is morning. Her head is uncovered, and the sun playing among the apple-tree leaves, which are stirred by a very gentle breeze, filters with its thin rays down to the dark brown earth of the flower-beds and forms small circles of light on Her blond head, so that Her hair looks like pure gold.

^{[Maria Valtorta describes her vision of Our Lady:]} I see a couple of people departing from a very modest house. A very Young mother comes down an outside staircase holding in her arms a child enveloped in a white cloth. I recognize our Mother. She is always the same: pale and blonde, agile and so kind in Her behavior. She is dressed in white, with a pale blue mantle and a white veil on Her head. She is carrying Her Child so carefully.