Presentation of the Blessed Virgin Mary

Lord, in the simplicity of my heart

I offer myself to You this day as Your servant for evermore,

for Your homage and for a sacrifice of perpetual praise.  

~Thomas à Kempis, Imitation of Christ, Bk IV, Chapter 9

Detail, The Presentation of the Virgin Mary by Titian (1534-38, Gallerie dell'Accademia, Venice)

"Mary's most beautiful name"

Hail, full of grace, the Lord is with you!  ~Luke 1:28

"Full of grace"....is Mary's most beautiful name, the name God himself gave to her to indicate that she has always been and will always be the beloved, the elect, the one chosen to welcome the most precious gift, Jesus: "the incarnate love of God."  ~Pope Benedict XVI

Annunciation of the Blessed Virgin Mary

Salvation to all that will is nigh;

That All, which always is All everywhere,

Which cannot sin, and yet all sins must bear,

Which cannot die, yet cannot choose but die,

Lo, faithful virgin, yields Himself to lie

In prison, in thy womb; and though He there

Can take no sin, nor thou give, yet He will wear,

Taken from thence, flesh, which death's force may try.

Ere by the spheres time was created, thou

Wast in His mind, who is thy Son and Brother;

Whom thou conceivst, conceived; yea, thou art now

Thy Maker's maker, and thy Father's mother;

Thou hast light in dark, and shut'st in little room,

Immensity cloistered in thy dear womb.

"Annunciation" by John Donne, 1572-1631

"Mary...woman of recollected prayer"

Today I wish to speak of the figure of Mary, who with the Apostles in the Upper Room prayerfully awaits the gift of the Holy Spirit. In all the events of her life, from the Annunciation through the Cross to Pentecost, Mary is presented by Saint Luke as a woman of recollected prayer and meditation on the mystery of God’s saving plan in Christ. In the Upper Room, we see Mary’s privileged place in the Church, of which she is the “exemplar and outstanding model in faith and charity” (Lumen Gentium, 53). As Mother of God and Mother of the Church, Mary prays in and with the Church at every decisive moment of salvation history. Let us entrust to her every moment of our own lives, and let her teach us the need for prayer, so that in loving union with her Son we may implore the outpouring of the Holy Spirit and the spread of the Gospel to all the ends of the earth. 

~Pope Benedict XVI, General Audience of 3/14/12

Dearest Mary, Mother Most Wonderful, teach me to pray, teach me to love.  Amen.

Advancing in faith...

...the Blessed Virgin advanced in her pilgrimage of faith, and faithfully persevered in her union with her Son unto the cross, where she stood, in keeping with the divine plan, grieving exceedingly with her only begotten Son, uniting herself with a maternal heart with His sacrifice, and lovingly consenting to the immolation of this Victim which she herself had brought forth. Finally, she was given by the same Christ Jesus dying on the cross as a mother to His disciple with these words: "Woman, behold thy son".  ~Lumen Gentium, #58

Dear Mary, Virgin most faithful, lead me in my pilgrimage of faith to the Cross, that, "in keeping with the divine plan," I may always stand there with your beloved Son, our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, who alone is our hope and salvation, our resurrection and life.  Amen.

Holding fast like Mary, with Mary...

O God, eternal majesty,
whose ineffable Word
the immaculate Virgin received
through the message of an Angel
and so became the dwelling-place of divinity,
filled with the light of the Holy Spirit,
grant, we pray, that by her example
we may in humility hold fast to your will.
Through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son,
who lives and reigns with you
in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
one God, for ever and ever.
Amen.

~Collect for December 20 from The Roman Missal

Dear Mary, Virgin of Advent, teach me your humility that I may always hold fast to the Father's will.  Amen.

"Your prayer has been heard..."

But the angel said to him, “Do not be afraid, Zechariah, because your prayer has been heard. Your wife Elizabeth will bear you a son, and you shall name him John." ~Luke 1:13

Ave Maria!  When I came to the above verse from today's Gospel (Lk 1:5-25), I recalled the catechesis on prayer that Pope Benedict XVI gave last Wednesday (view here), in which he reflected on the prayer of Jesus in the story of Lazarus, who had died and for whom our Lord grieved and prayed.  This prayer of Jesus, the Holy Father teaches us, "is a prayer that manifests once again His unique relationship of knowledge and communion with the Father."  Pondering  Christ's filial relationship with the Father, the Holy Father continues:

"Dear brothers and sisters, in reading this narrative each one of us is called to understand that in the prayer of petition to the Lord, we must not expect an immediate fulfillment of our requests, of our will; rather, we must entrust ourselves to the Father’s Will, interpreting each event within the perspective of His glory, of His design of love, which is often mysterious to our eyes.

"This is why -- in our prayer -- petition, praise and thanksgiving should coalesce, even when it seems to us that God is not responding to our concrete expectations. Abandonment to God’s love, which precedes and accompanies us always, is one of the attitudes at the heart of our conversation with Him. The Catechism of the Catholic Church comments in this way on Jesus’ prayer in the account of the raising of Lazarus: 'Jesus’ prayer, characterized by thanksgiving, reveals to us how to ask: before the gift is given, Jesus commits Himself to the One who in giving gives Himself. The Giver is more precious than the gift; He is the "treasure"; in Him abides His Son’s heart; the gift is given "as well"' (Matthew 6:21 and 6:33) (2604).

"This seems to me to be very important: before the gift is given, to adhere to Him who gives; the Giver is more precious than the gift. Also for us, then, beyond what God gives us when we call upon Him, the greatest gift He can give us is His friendship, His presence, His love. He is the precious treasure we should ask for and treasure always."

We really don't know much about Zechariah and his own prayer, other than the fact that his prayer was indeed answered -- and magnificently so! -- but that he also doubted for he did not believe the angel's words that his prayer had been heard.  In our "Zechariah moments," it is good to recall the Holy Father's reminder that "Jesus’ example teaches us that in our own prayers we must always trust in the Father’s will and strive to see all things in the light of his mysterious plan of love."

Dear Mary, Virgin of Advent, teach me to trust in the Father's will as you did.  Amen.

4th Sunday of Advent

You shall conceive and bear a son. ~Luke :31

Today’s reading of the gospel calls to mind the beginning of our redemption, for the passage tells us how God sent an angel from heaven to a virgin.

He was to proclaim the new birth, the incarnation of God’s Son, who would take away our age-old guilt; through him it would be possible for us to be made new and numbered among the children of God.

And so, if we are to deserve the gifts of the promised salvation, we must listen attentively to the account of its beginning.

The angel Gabriel was sent from God to a city of Galilee named Nazareth, to a virgin betrothed to a man whose name was Joseph of the house of David; and the virgin’s name was Mary.

What is said of the house of David applies not only to Joseph but also to Mary. It was a precept of the law that each man should marry a wife from his own tribe and kindred.

Saint Paul also bears testimony to this when he writes to Timothy: Remember Jesus Christ, risen from the dead, descended from David, as preached in my gospel. Our Lord is truly descended from David, since his spotless mother took her ancestry from David’s line.

The angel came to her and said, “Do not be afraid, Mary, for you have found favor with God And behold, you will conceive in your womb and bear a son, and you shall call his name Jesus. He will be great, and will be called the Son of the Most High; and the Lord God will give to him the throne of his father David.”

The angel refers to the kingdom of the Israelite nation as the throne of David because in his time, by the Lord’s command and assistance, David governed it with a spirit of faithful service. The Lord God gave to our Redeemer the throne of his father David, when he decreed that he should take flesh from the lineage of David.

As David had once ruled the people with temporal authority, so Christ would now lead them to the eternal kingdom by his spiritual grace. Of this kingdom the Apostle said: He has delivered us from the dominion of darkness and transferred us to the kingdom of his beloved Son.

He will reign over the house of Jacob for ever. The house of Jacob here refers to the universal Church which, through its faith in and witness to Christ, shares the heritage of the patriarchs. This may apply either to those who are physical descendants of the patriarchal families, or to those who come from gentile nations and are reborn in Christ by the waters of baptism.

In this house Christ shall reign for ever, and of his kingdom there will be no end.

During this present life, Christ rules in the Church. By faith and love he dwells in the hearts of his elect, and guides them by his unceasing care toward their heavenly reward.

In the life to come, when their period of exile on earth is ended, he will exercise his kingship by leading the faithful to their heavenly country. There, for ever inspired by the vision of his presence, their one delight will be to praise and glorify him.

~from a homily on Advent by St. Bede

Mary, "a kind of sacrament"

Mary is the woman who does not see herself, unless it be in Christ and, through Him, in humanity; by giving birth to Jesus, who is the Son of God and the Son of Man, she gave birth to humanity. In the fiat of the Annunciation is the adherence of every one of us.

That is why no being is as permeable to the love of Christ as is the Blessed Virgin. That is why, as Dante says, she is the daughter of her Son. She is born of her Son, according to divine life, and that is why she was born of Him as He could be born of her.

This is precisely the reason why the Most Blessed Virgin remains a way of light to Jesus for us. It is a fact that it is impossible not to love the Blessed Virgin when we love Christ...

The Most Blessed Virgin is a kind of sacrament, the sacrament of God's tender love for us, for God is as much a father as a mother; and besides, she is especially the Mother of Christ in us.

For Mary's motherhood is not a motherhood in time, it is a motherhood in eternity because she conceived in a total and absolute gift of herself, because she adopted us all in this acceptance of Jesus within her entire being. There is no end to her motherhood. She is the one who is the Mother of Christ in our lives; that is her role throughout eternity.

Hence, it is absolutely natural for us to expose ourselves to the radiant influence of the Blessed Virgin in order to receive from her this Christ she is eternally responsible for bring to life in us. This is a wonderful and infallible gesture. It is impossible to turn ourselves to the Blessed Virgin without reaching Christ through her for, since she has nothing, she can only lead us to Him.

To follow that road is to follow the very order of the Incarnation since it is through Mary that Jesus entered the world. It is always through Mary that Christ will enter into our souls; and the most amazing part of our trust in this inexhaustible motherhood of the Blessed Virgin is that we can at every moment avail ourselves of the love of the Blessed Virgin and offer it to our Lord.

~Father Maurice Zundel in With God in Our Daily Life

Dear Mary, Virgin of Advent, I follow you because I know you will lead me to your beloved  Son, Jesus, whom you carried in your womb with love beyond all telling.  Amen.

Feast of Our Lady of Guadalupe

Hear and let it penetrate into your heart, my dear little son: Let nothing discourage you, nothing depress you. Let nothing alter your heart or your countenance. Also, do not fear any illness or vexation, anxiety or pain. Am I not here who am your mother? Are you not under my shadow and protection? Am I not your fountain of life? Are you not in the folds of my mantle, in the crossing of my arms? Is there anything else that you need?

~Words of Our Lady of Guadalupe to St. Juan Diego, Dec. 12, 1531

Dearest Mary, thank you for being our Mother Most Wonderful!  Amen!  Alleluia!

Waiting in Mary-darkness

I live my Advent in the womb of Mary,
And on one night when a great star swings free
from its high mooring and walks down the sky
to be the dot above the Christus i,
I shall be born of her by blessed grace.
I wait in Mary-darkness, faith’s walled place,
with hope’s expectance of nativity.

I knew for long she carried me and fed me,
guarded and loved me, though I could not see.
But only now, with inward jubilee,
I come upon earth’s most amazing knowledge:
someone is hidden in this dark with me.

~"Advent" by Jessica Powers aka Sr. Miriam of the Holy Spirit, O.C.D.

Solemnity of the Immaculate Conception of the Blessed Virgin Mary

As a merciful Mother, Mary is the anticipated figure and everlasting portrait of the Son. Thus, we see that the image of the Sorrowful Virgin, of the Mother who shares her suffering and her love, is also a true image of the Immaculate Conception. Her heart was enlarged by being and feeling together with God. In her, God's goodness came very close to us.

Mary thus stands before us as a sign of comfort, encouragement and hope. She turns to us, saying: "Have the courage to dare with God! Try it! Do not be afraid of him! Have the courage to risk with faith! Have the courage to risk with goodness! Have the courage to risk with a pure heart! Commit yourselves to God, then you will see that it is precisely by doing so that your life will become broad and light, not boring but filled with infinite surprises, for God's infinite goodness is never depleted!"

On this Feast Day, let us thank the Lord for the great sign of his goodness which he has given us in Mary, his Mother and the Mother of the Church. Let us pray to him to put Mary on our path like a light that also helps us to become a light and to carry this light into the nights of history. Amen.

~Pope Benedict XVI, 12/8/05

Dear Mary, Virgin of Advent, grant me a share of your courage that, like you and with you, I may dare with God, whose "infinite goodness is never depleted."  Amen!  Alleluia!

Memory and Hope

"Advent is concerned with that very connection between memory and hope which is so necessary to man. Advent’s intention is to awaken the most profound and basic emotional memory within us, namely, the memory of the God who became a child. This is a healing memory; it brings hope. The purpose of the Church’s year is continually to rehearse her great history of memories, to awaken the heart’s memory so that it can discern the star of hope.…It is the beautiful task of Advent to awaken in all of us memories of goodness and thus to open doors of hope."

~Pope Benedict XVI

I think of the days of long ago,
and remember the years long past.
At night I muse within my heart.
I ponder, and my spirit questions.
~Psalm 77(76):6-7

In you I hope all day long
because of your goodness, O Lord.
~Psalm 25(24):5

Dear Mary, Virgin of Advent, awaken in me the memory of your Divine Child, the Dayspring from on High, whose birth is the dawn of everlasting hope. Amen.

Learning to Pray

"In our catechesis on prayer, we now turn to Jesus, who by his own example most fully reveals the mystery of Christian prayer. A significant moment in this regard is Jesus’ prayer following his Baptism, which expresses his both his deepest identity as the Son of God and his solidarity with the sinful humanity whom he came to save. Jesus’ prayer reflects his complete, filial obedience to the Father’s will, an obedience which would lead him to death on the Cross for the redemption of our sins. With his human heart, Jesus learned to pray from his Mother and from the Jewish tradition, yet the source of his prayer is his eternal communion with the Father; as the incarnate Son, he shows us perfectly how to pray as children of the heavenly Father. Jesus’ example of fidelity to prayer challenges us to examine the time and effort we devote to our own prayer. While prayer is a gift of God, it is also an art learned through constant practice. Jesus teaches us to pray constantly, but also to bear witness before others of the beauty of prayer, self-surrender and complete openness to God."

~Pope Benedict XVI, General Audience, 11/30/11

Ave Maria!  The Holy Father says something that I tend to forget:  "With his human heart, Jesus learned to pray from his Mother."  As a child, I learned to pray from my parents, from my dear Mummie and Daddy.  And I am still learning to pray for I am still a child -- childlike, that is, not childish.  So why would I not let Mary, the Mother of Jesus and my own "Mother Most Wonderful," along with her Beloved Son, teach me to pray?  We frequently say, "Lord, teach us to pray," but how often do we ask the same of our Blessed Mother?

Dearest Jesus and Mary, thank you for teaching me to pray.  Please help me to eagerly and gladly keep learning from you the gift and the art, the beauty and the joy of prayer, of eternal communion with the Father who loves us so much.  Amen.

The Silence of Mary

Holy Mary, Mother of God, you who treasured all things and pondered them carefully in your heart, teach us that deep, interior silence which enfolded you throughout your lifetime ~

the silence of the Annunciation, of faith, mission and obedience;

the silence of the Visitation, of humility, service and praise;

the silence of Bethlehem, of birth, incarnation and wonder;

the silence of the flight into Egypt, of perseverance, hope and trust;

the silence of Nazareth, of simplicity, intimacy and communion;

the silence of Mt. Calvary, of courage, death and abandonment;

the silence of Easter, of resurrection, jubilation and glory;

the silence of Ascension, of fulfillment, transformation and new crea-tion;

the silence of Pentecost, of peace, power and love.

Dearest Mary, in your wisdom, teach us that silence which enables us to listen to the small, still voice of our God; which compels us to worship Him alone in spirit and in truth; which empowers us to acknowledge our nothingness and exult confidently in our Savior; which frees us to lose ourselves in unceasing adoration of the God who is Infinite Love. Holy Mary, Mother of God, pray for us now and always, that we may enter into that silence of yours which unites us to Jesus, your Son, in the mystery of His silence before the Father of mercies. Amen.

Copyright 1993 ~ Alice Claire Mansfield

An Advent Prayer for Our Priests

In this time of special Grace, this blessed season of Advent, we pray to you, O Holy Virgin Mary, for our priests. Give them a heart that is able to relive Christ's coming in their lives, a heart able to contemplate the way in which the Son of God, on the day of their Ordination, radically and definitely marked their entire existence immerging them in His priestly heart. May Christ renew them daily in the Eucharistic Celebration so that their own lives become transfigured into His coming for humanity. Give our priests an attentive heart able to recognize the signs of Jesus' coming in the lives of every man, especially to the young who are entrusted to them, so that they are able to recognize the sign of that special coming which is the vocation to the Priesthood.

~Adapted from the 2011 Advent message given to priests by Cardinal Mauro Piacenza, prefect of the Congregation for the Clergy

Ave Maria!  Cardinal Mauro's message, which can be accessed here, is worthy of our attention and reflection, even if we are not members of the clergy.  Our Lady is, as Cardinal Mauro calls her, the Icon and Model of the Church, and all of us can learn from her to live as she did, "in vigilance, filled with loving and grateful wonder."  Dear Mary, Virgin of Advent, pray for us as we journey with you to Bethlehem.  Amen.

First Tuesday of Advent



Mary the New Eve
Statue from Ecuador


I give you praise, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, for although you have hidden these things from the wise and the learned you have revealed them to the childlike. Yes, Father, such has been your gracious will. ~Luke 10:21

Advent has a twofold character, for it is a time of preparation for the Solemnities of Christmas, in which the First Coming of the son of God to humanity is remembered, and likewise a time when, by remembrance of this, minds and hearts are led to look forward to Christ's Second Coming at the end of time. For these two reasons, Advent is a period of devout and expectant delight.

~from The Roman Missal, Third Edition
"Universal Norms on the Liturgical Year and the Calendar"

Dear Mary, Virgin of Advent, teach me the devout and expectant delight of Advent that was yours as you sheltered in your womb the Divine Child, for whom you longed "with love beyond all telling."  Amen.

First Monday of Advent

Through the tender mercy of our God,
the dayspring from on high will visit us
to shine on those who sit in darkness
and the shadow of death,
and to guide our feet
into the path of peace.
~see Luke 1:78



Mary,
Virgin of expectation and Mother of hope,
revive the spirit of Advent
in your entire Church,
so that all humanity may start out anew
on the journey towards Bethlehem,
from which it came,
and that the Sun that dawns upon us
from on high
will come once again to visit us,
Christ our God.
Amen.

~Pope Benedict XVI, Homily of 12/1/07

Dear Mary, Virgin of Advent, with you I wait in expectation and hope for the birth of Eternal Light.  Amen.

The rosary helps me to be a child...

Ave Maria!  In October 1973, on the occasion of the 4th centenary of the Feast of the Rosary, the future Pope John Paul I, Albino Luciani, then Patriarch of Venice, gave a homily suited to the occasion. He concluded his homily with these words:

"When we speak of 'adult Christians' in prayer, at times we exaggerate. Personally when I speak tête-à-tête with God or with the Blessed Virgin Mary, more than an adult I prefer to think of myself as a child. The mitre, skullcap and ring disappear; I give a holiday to the adult and the bishop and also to heavy burdens, sober and pondered, and let myself go with the spontaneous tenderness of a child in front of his papá or mamma. To be – at least for half an hour – before God as I truly am with my wretchedness and also with the best of myself: to feel rising from the depths of my being the child of other days who wants to talk and chat with the Lord and love him and who sometimes feels the need to cry that he may be granted mercy, all this helps me to pray. The rosary, a simple and easy prayer, helps me to be at times a child again and of this I am not in the least ashamed.

"The rosary a prayer of repetition? Père de Foucauld used to say: 'Love is expressed in a few words, always the same, repeated time and time again.'"

Dearest Mary, Mother Most Wonderful, how good it is to be your child!

Marian Prayer for Vocations

Mary, humble servant of God Most High,
the Son to whom you gave birth has made you the servant of humanity.
Your life was a humble and generous service.
You were servant of the Word when the angel
announced to you the divine plan of salvation.
You were servant of the Son, giving him life
and remaining open to his mystery.
You were servant of Redemption,
standing courageously at the foot of the Cross,
close to the Suffering Servant and Lamb,
who was sacrificing himself for love of us.
You were servant of the Church on the day of Pentecost
and with your intercession you continue to generate her in every believer,
even in these, our difficult and troubled times.
Let the young people of the third millennium look
to you, young daughter of Israel,
who have known the agitation of a young heart
when faced with the plan of the Eternal God.
Make them able to accept the invitation of your Son
to give their lives wholly for the glory of God.
Make them understand that to serve God satisfies the heart,
and that only in the service of God and of his kingdom
do we realize ourselves in accordance with the divine plan,
and life becomes a hymn of glory to the Most Holy Trinity.
Amen.

~Blessed John Paul II

Ave Maria! What a beautiful prayer for vocations this is! Blessed John Paul II wrote it for the 2003 World Day of Prayer for Vocations, and it's a real keeper.  I especially like how it describes Our Lady's role as servant of humanity -- of the Word, of the Son, of Redemption, and of the Church.  Oh, to become more and more like her, always and everywhere "our life, our sweetness and our hope"!  Blessed be Jesus, living in Mary!