The Six Kowtows – along with devotion to the Eucharist – are the most important revelations given by heaven to Lucia Phan. With many graces and miracles – even a deliverance – being reported through The Six Kowtows, the question arises: “Why are they so powerful?” We should not be surprised they are powerful since they are not the product of human ingenuity but were revealed by heaven. As such, The Six Kowtows are a perfect gift. What is it, then, that God and Blessed Mother are using to make this a perfect prayer practice?
First of all, The Six Kowtows engage our whole being in prayer: soul and body. This is significant because we are body/soul composites, not just one or the other. This is an important point. Contrary to what the world believes, the body is good – so much so that our bodies will be resurrected at the “general judgment” for eternity. It is no accident that we have bodies, so why shouldn’t we use them in prayer?
The great St. Dominic knew this truth well; he practiced and wrote of his nine ways to pray with both soul and body. One of his ways is the classic “full body” prostration practiced by so many saints throughout the 2,000 years of Church history. So often we separate our soul and body in the spiritual life, but the Bible – and the Church – teach that the body is good: the Lord is “for the body. […] Do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit within you, which you have from God? You are not your own; you were bought with a price. So glorify God in your body” (1 Corinthians 6:13, 19-20). One does this in practicing The Six Kowtows, in a way that is much more profound than kneeling. So The Six Kowtows as prayer have the distinct advantage of incorporating our bodies.
As prostrations, The Six Kowtows are not new. Specifically, the kowtow type of prostration was first introduced to Christians at Fatima in 1916 by the Angel of Peace; it was almost exactly as revealed to Lucia Phan but no name for it was given. Almost 100 years went by and people had not prostrated themselves as the Angel of Peace instructed, so the kowtow was revealed again through Lucia Phan. (For much more on the Fatima-kowtow connection, please see “The Six Kowtows” message of August 19, 2014.) It cannot be a coincidence that Sr. Lucia of Fatima and Lucia Phan have the same name… Sr. Lucia was even “kowtowing” in her convent’s chapel right before receiving her final apparition.
Those who practice The Six Kowtows can attest to the fact that prayer can be much better when one is kowtowing. The kowtow is an intrinsic sign of surrender and submission to God. The physical reality is followed in short order by the same spiritual reality: humble prayer to God most high and the Queen of the universe. It is a profound humbling of oneself before God; so much so that many people will not kowtow because it is too humbling, but the two greatest virtues are humility and charity.
“[…] ‘God opposes the proud, but gives grace to the humble.’ Humble yourselves therefore under the mighty hand of God, that in due time he may exalt you” (1 Peter 5:5-6). “Every one who exalts himself will be humbled, but he who humbles himself will be exalted” (Luke 18:14). The Old and New Testaments are full of such quotes on humility. St. Augustine and St. Gregory the Great regarded humility as critical – vitally important to the spiritual life. It is a “keystone” virtue. It is a gateway to all the other virtues. As the Catechism of the Catholic Church teaches, “humility is the foundation of prayer. Only when we humbly acknowledge that ‘we do not know how to pray as we ought,’ are we ready to receive freely the gift of prayer. ‘Man is a beggar before God’” (2559). Mankind greatly needs to humble itself. Man is exceedingly proud now. Even in the Church today, some have sought to do away with kneeling!
The time has come for man to humble himself before God … and there is no better way than kowtowing. Heaven knows this and that is why The Six Kowtows were sent through Blessed Mother. As revealed numerous times in the messages, She kowtowed throughout Her earthly life; in a certain sense no one needed to kowtow less than Her, but She did, regularly. If the holiest creature by far kowtowed, what about us sinners? You better believe we need to kowtow.
Getting in the kowtow position has a profound psychological effect. It naturally brings about humility, supplication and reverence, like kneeling but to a far greater degree inasmuch as more of the body is humbling itself. It sends a strong message to ourselves that we are nothing before God, nothing compared to God. Things are – in a physical, demonstrable and visible way – put into right order. Everything is in its place: neat, clean and ordered. God longs for this order in us. He does not need to be praised; this helps us see who we are and who God is – as the saying goes, “God is God and we are not.”
Many graces come easily when practicing The Six Kowtows. This is especially true in adoration, the ideal place to practice them; it is intrinsic adoration, praise and worship. The body does the talking; when we add our heartfelt words, the prayer becomes complete and powerful. Sorrow for sin and reverence come naturally. The posture is deeply meaningful – sometimes tears will just start flowing, the reason unknown. This is in part due to the fact that we pray differently in the kowtow position. Depths can be plumbed. To be sure, conversion is accelerated for those who practice The Six Kowtows.
They lead to interior silence so one can pray better. As Psalm 46 says, “Be still, and know that I am God. […]” Interior peace is a common fruit of The Six Kowtows, as we lay it all before the Lord – the ideal is complete transparency, sublime vulnerability before the One who loves us, The Divine Mercy and Abba Father in whom we rightly place all our trust. God is so pleased when we kowtow! He wants us to re-order our relationship with Him through this gift from Blessed Mother. He has gone so far as to show us how to do this, for our relationship with Him is all-important:
Now as they went on their way, he entered a village; and a woman named Martha received him into her house. And she had a sister called Mary, who sat at the Lord’s feet and listened to his teaching. But Martha was distracted with much serving; and she went to him and said, “Lord, do you not care that my sister has left me to serve alone? Tell her then to help me.” But the Lord answered her, “Martha, Martha, you are anxious and troubled about many things; one thing is needful. Mary has chosen the good portion, which shall not be taken away from her” (Luke 10:38-42).
We are Martha too often in life. He wants us to imitate this Mary through The Six Kowtows. Prayer is “the soul of the apostolate.”
There are numerous other reasons why The Six Kowtows are so effective. They can be practiced by anyone – practically anywhere, any time. With two minutes being a good minimum time to spend on each kowtow (*), people can make the prayer practice as long or short as they want. (The Fatima visionaries would sometimes “kowtow” for hours at a time.) Even in a worst-case scenario, in which one truly cannot physically get into the kowtow posture, heaven understands, and he or she can simply make a head bow or the equivalent while praying each kowtow, thus prostrating the soul.
The completeness of The Six Kowtows is also seen in their balance. They employ the emotions in a positive way: spontaneity and naturalness with the prayers is the expectation since it is to be prayer from the heart. If our prayer is overly mechanical it will be superficial. Emotions are neither good nor evil; it is only when we act on them that they can take on moral character, as in the case of, for example, anger – it is when we indulge in it that it becomes sinful. But the emotions are good as created by God; as such they can and should be part of prayer. Under-control emotion is another advantage of The Six Kowtows. (They are particularly powerful after one has sinned, when one needs to humble himself before God, when one is perplexed or stressed, or when one is in special need.) This is a prayer practice that lets you pray with your whole being: heart and mind, body and soul.
In each kowtow there can be mental prayer (friendly conversation with God), deemed to be so important by the great mystic and Doctor of the Church, St. Teresa of Avila. The Six Kowtows strongly foster personal relationship with the Person in each kowtow. Another advantage is that they are ideal for adoration of the Blessed Sacrament, when people often don’t know what to “do.” One can kowtow for an hour or more. The body gets used to it.
Further, it has been revealed in these messages that we are in the end times. Frankly, we will have greater need for surrender and supplication to God now. The time has come for The Six Kowtows. For example, we have seen very clearly that people in poor countries will practice The Six Kowtows while those in the first world will not because they are proud and prosperous. When they need God, though, as will happen soon, they will kowtow and believe in this private revelation. This, too, has been revealed. God has given us the perfect means to come back to Him in The Six Kowtows. As said so often in the messages, “the time has come.”
A final advantage of them is that one evangelizes through them if they are done publicly in a church or chapel. Others simply see you doing them and are often deeply impressed. No words are necessary. As the saying goes, “Preach the Gospel at all times. Use words if necessary.” Evangelizing through The Six Kowtows is part of heaven’s plan. Like anything, it gets easier the more one does it, and the self-consciousness does subside with time. God wants us to do this, so it doesn’t matter in the end what others think.
In conclusion, as we have seen, God and Blessed Mother have given us a perfect prayer practice, which takes advantage of a number of factors to create a new prayer form that is in many ways advantageous over other types of prayer. This is proven in the many graces and even miracles that can accompany this prayer practice. As Scripture says, “the wind blows where it wills” (John 3:8). The Holy Spirit is with The Six Kowtows.
Come back to God through The Six Kowtows! Whether we are advanced in prayer or completely new at it, Blessed Mother shows us the way of daily conversion, repentance, prayer, and penance. Practice The Six Kowtows and you will see spiritual growth in your life.
New Revelations Through the Eucharist
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