“Let us not imagine that we obscure the glory of the Son by
the praise we lavish on the Mother; for the more [Mary] is honored, the greater
is the glory of her Son.”-St. Bernard of Clairvaux
It
seems as though many times people, especially non-Catholics, question the
honoring and praise of Mary, the Mother of God.
This is a terrible mistake that is led by the fear that we are giving
worship to Mary and not to Christ because we honor her even though the fourth
commandment says honor your father and your mother, yet no one worships their
parents, at least I hope not. When we
give honor to Mary not only are we worshiping Christ in a more perfect way but
we are also imitating Him because Christ never sinned and therefore never broke
the fourth commandment.
On the
cross Christ seeing his mother and the disciple he loved standing near her, He
said to His mother, “Woman, this is your son.” Then to the disciple he said,
“This is your mother.” And from this
moment the disciple made a place for her in his home (The Jerusalem Bible, Jn.
19:26-27). Some people today interpret
this as being said only for John and not for the rest of the faithful, however
from the beginning of the Christianity it has been understood that she is the
mother of the whole body of Christ. We
are all members of the Body of Christ because Christ did
not say to St. Paul on his road to Damascus why are you persecuting my
followers but said, “Saul, Saul, why are you persecuting me?” (Acts, 9:4). St. Paul latter confirms this in by writing,
“Now you together are Christ body.” (1 Cr. 12:27). How can the body of Christ have a separate
mother from the head? In addition to
this Mary is the new Eve and just as Eve was the mother of all men and women,
now Mary becomes the mother of all that are born anew by water and the spirit (Jn 3:5).
How do we pray to Mary?
Lets
look at the most common Marian prayer, the Hail Mary. The opening line is “Hail Mary, full of Grace.
The Lord is with thee” (Lk. 1:28). Gabriel greeted Mary with these words. This in
effect made her become our mother since she chooses to be the mother of Christ
and we are his body. Could there be a
better way to greet and ask our mother to ask the favors of her son, than the
greeting in which she was asked to become our mother by becoming the mother of
Christ? Also there is no one that was,
is, or ever will be as humble as Mary, with the exception of her Son, for there
has been no one more highly exulted then Mary besides her Son. Anyone who exalts himself will be humbled,
and anyone who humbles himself will be exalted (Mt. 23:12). Therefore when Mary hears the words of Hail
Mary she turns to the Holy Trinity and gives more and better thanksgiving then
we could ever merit for the graces which God has bestowed on her.
The
next line is “blessed art thou among women and blessed is the fruit of your
womb, Jesus” (Lk. 1:42). This is what
St. Elizabeth says to Mary when she greets her at the visitation and notice
that Mary responds with the Magnificat saying:
My soul proclaims the
greatness of the Lord,
My spirit rejoices in
God my Savior
For he has looked with
favor on his lowly servant.
From this day all generations will call me blessed:
The Almighty has done
great things for me,
And holy is his Name.He has mercy on those who fear him
In every generation.
He has shown the strength of his arm,
He has scattered the
proud in their conceit.
He has cast down the
mighty from their thrones,
And has lifted up the
lowly.
He has fill the hungry
with good things.
And the rich he has
sent away empty.
For he has remembered
his promise of mercy,
The promise He made to
our fathers,
To Abraham and his children for
ever (Lk. 1:46-55)
This
whole saying is about Mary praising the Lord for the gifts that he has bestowed
upon her and this is the same type of praise is given every time we imitate St.
Elizabeth at the visitation. How much
sweeter are these words than any words that we could say to Christ, for they
come from His sinless mother who is the greatest of all His creation. When we humble ourselves to have Mary speak
to Christ for us, our prayer becomes greater than any prayer we could marit on
our own, for it is not just about the words that we speak but also what love that
abides in our heart for Christ. What
person loves Christ more than His mother who has never sinned against Him and
had a mothers love for Him? What person does
Christ love more than Mary?
The next line is “Holy
Mary, Mother of God.” Mary became the mother of Christ humanity
which cannot be separated from his divinity, because Christ is one person with
two natures, one divine and one human which was given to him by Mary. He is not two persons with each having its
own nature. Therefore Mary is the mother
of God even though his divinity created Mary and precedes time. If anyone does not agree that holy Mary is
Mother of God, he is at odds with the Godhead [St. Gregory of Nazianz, Letterto Cledonius the Priest 101 (A.D. 382)].
It is because of Christ being one person that His words may be
fulfilled, “Father, may they be one in us, as you are in me and I am in you.”
(Jn. 17:21). How could we become one in
the Father and the Son if the Son is not one in himself but two? Since Christ humanity and divinity cannot be
separated, Mary must be the Mother of God if she is the Mother of Christ in the
flesh.
The final line of the prayer
is “Pray for us sinners, now and at the hour of our death Amen.” This shows how we always direct our prayer
towards Christ and realize that Mary in not the source but the instrument in
which Christ has chosen to use. If we
can become instruments to pray for one another, how much better is it when the
Mother of God and our spiritual mother prays for us especially at the hour of
our death when there may be no one else to pray for us?
As we
can see praying to Mary is not something that takes away from Christ but makes
our prayers more fitting for Christ to receive them and glorifies Him more. Mary, Queen of Heaven and of Earth, pray for
us sinners now and at the hour of our death Amen.
Touching!!!
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Clara is a friend from South Korea that I met on my recent trip to Hawaii.
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