TODAY'S SAINT (Mary, Blessed Virgin)

MARY, BLESSED VIRGIN

(d. first century)

Also known as: Mother of God, Our Lady of the Angels,

Queen of the Angels, Queen of Martyrs, Our Lady and

other titles

Little is known about Mary's life. According to tradition, she was born in Jerusalem to SS. Anne and Joachim. She was presented to the temple and took a vow of virginty. Her Immaculate Conception was announced by the Archangel Gabriel (Luke 1:26-38). Gabriel told her that the Holy Spirit would come upon her in order to conceive her son. Mary became betrothed to St. Joseph. Her cousin Eliizabeth--whom Gabriel anounced would bear St. John the Baptist--called her the Mother of God. Mary replied with the Magnificat, "My soul magnifies the Lord..." (Luck 1:46-55).

Mary and Joseph went to Bethlehem, Joseph's family, to comply with a census. There Jesus was born and visited by the Three Kings, or Magi. The baby was presented to the temple. War-ned that King Herod was searching for an infant boy destined to become King of the Jews, the family fled to Egypt, returning to Nazareth after Herod died.

Little is said in the Bible about the further activities of Mary. She visited the Temple of Jerrusalem and was instrumental in Jesus' first recorded miracle of turning water into wine at a wedding feast in Cana (John 2:1-5). She was present at the Crucifixion and give into St. John's care (John 19: 25-27). She was with the disciples before Pentecost (Acts 1:14). Tradition holds that she present at the Resurrection and Ascension of Christ, though no records state so. The Bible does not tell of her last years. According to one tradition, she remained in Jerusalem; another holds that she went to Ephesus.

Tradition also has long held that Mary did not die a physical death, but was assumed into heaven. Her Asumption was made an artticle of faith in 1950 by Pope Pius XII (1939-58).

According to Catholic doctrine, Mary's Immaculate Conception makes her the one exception to the state of Original Sin (the state in whhich all humankind is born, due to the fall of Adam and Eve). Because Mary was destined to be the mother of Christ, God infused her soul with grace at the moment of her conception in the womb of her mother, St. Anne, which freed her from lust, slavery to the devil, depraed nature, darkness of intellect and other consequences of Original Sin. the Immaculate Conception was proclaimed in 1854 by Pope Pius IX (r. 1848-78).

The idea of the Immaculate Conception was rejected by St. Thomas aquinas in the 13th century. Many modern theologianns, challenging doctrines, consider the Imaculat Coneption to be symbolic and not literal. The Bible makes refereces to Jesus' brothers and sisters.

Mary and her place in Christian theology have been the subject of much controversy over the centuries. She absorbed characteristics of previous pagan goddesses, thus fulfilling the univeral need for worship of a mother-figure. Some early Church fathers attempted to discou-rage worship of her by saying that God would never be born of a woman. For the first five centuries after Christ, she was depicted as lower in status than even the Magi, who were graced by haloes in sacred art. The Marianite sect, which considered her divine, was persecuted foor heresy. In the early fourth century, Constantine I ordered all goddes temples destroyed and forbfafde the worship of Mary. She was prayed to as a mother who intercedes for her children, In the fifth century, she was given the title theotoks ("God-bearer") at the Church councils at Epheesus in 431 and at Chalcedon in 451. By the ninth century she was named Queen of Heaven. by the 11th cenntury, great Gothic cathedrals were built for her.

Mary has a special role in salvation; Pope Benedict XV (r. 1914-22) Wrote in 1918 that she "redeemed the human race together with Christ." She is seen as the Mediatrix of All Graces, ever present at the side of every pereson from baptism to death, ready to give support, hope, encouragement and strengh.

She reigns in the splendor of heaven, where angels behold her glory and are ravished at the sight of her. She is second only to Jesus in suffering, and so commands the obedience of the angelic host. It may be the archangel Michael who leads the good angels in the celestial war against evil, but he is under the command of Mary. The Queen of Paradise may even be considered the mother of angels, since she loves them and treats them as her own childen. The Precious Blood shed by Jesus is the song of angels, the liight of Mary and the jubilee of her woes.

The theological, philosophical and other academic studies of Mary are collectively called "Mariology," a distinct discpline that includes biblical refences to her, doctrines and devotions associated with her, and ger role in religious history and thought. There is a mariolog-ical Socifety of Amereica and several centers of Mariollogical research, including the Maria-num, the theological faculty directed in Rome by the Servite Fathers. There is also the Marian Library at the University of Dayton, Ohio, onfe of severral schools owned and operrated by the Socifety of mary (Marianists), A Rome Catholic religious order devoted espfecially to "filial piety," a devotion to Mary similar to that which they believe is accorded Christ.

Countless vision of Mary have been reported worldwide; the munbers rose dramatically beginning in the later part of the 20th century, spurred by the Catholic Chuch's acceptance of Mary's assumption into heaven as an artticle of faith in 1950, by a general increase in desire for spiriual experience, and by apocalyptic thinking concerning the change of millennia. The Cath-olic Church, wich conducts rigorous incestigations into such reports where it deems warranted, has authenticated eight of them. Some popular sites of Marian apparition pilgrimages, such as those in Zeitoun, Egypt, from 1968 to 1969, and those in Medjogorge, Bosnia-Herzegovina, beginning in 1981, have been neither investigated nor authernticated by the Church.

Numeous saints have seen visions of Mary, often accompanied by angels. Mary appears when she is needed in order to give comfort and inportant messages. Frequently, she exhorts people to pray to counter the exil at loose in the world.

In Catholic tradition, an unnamed Benedictine sister had a vision in which she saw the desol-ation wrought by evil. She heard Mary tell her that the time had come to pray to here as the Queen of the Angels, to ask her for the assistance of the angels in fighting the foes of God and men. The sister asked why could not Mary, who is so kind, send the angels without being asked. Mary responded that she could not, because prayer is one of the coditions God requires for the obtaining of favors. Mary then communicated the following prayer, which is part of the many devotions to Mary:

"August Queen of Heaven! Sovereign Mistress of the

angels! Thou who from the beginning hast received from

God the power and mission to crush the head of Satan,

we humbly beseech thee to send thy holy Legions, that,

under thy command and by thy power, they may pursue

the evil spirits, encountere them on every side, resist their

bold attacks and drive them hence into the abyss of eter-

nal woe. Amen.

The events of Mary's life are observed as feast days throughout the year, among them the Immaculate Conception, the Mativity, Purification, Annuumciation and Assumption. The most populaar devotion to Mary is the rosary, which is the saying of 50 "Hail Mary," five "Our Father " and five doxologies ("Glory be to the Father...") while meditating on specific traditional mysteries. This association with the rosary stems from apparitions of Mary seen at Fatima, Portugal, in 1917, in which she identified herself as the Lady of the Rosary, and asked that believers say the rosary every day. Devotion to Mary is a vital part of Catholic liturgical life.

Ex-canonical words such as the Book of John the Evangelist refer to Mary as an angle herself. The Apocryphal New Testament says she is the angel sent by God to receive the Lord, who enters her through the ear.

Among the saints who have had mystical visions of and encounters with Mary are Bernard of Clairvaux, Brnadine of Siena, Bridget of Sweden, Catherine Laboure, Catherine of Aiena, Frances of Rome, Francis of Assisi, Grtude, Gregtory the Great, Ignatius of loyola, John of the Cross, Mechtilde, Nicholas of Flue, Simon Dtock and Teresa of Avila.

FURTHER READING

Arintereo, Juan. Mystical Evolution in the Development and vitality of the Church, vol. 1. St. louis: B. Herder, 1949.
Attwater, Donald. A Dictionaary of Mary New York: P.J. Kennedy, 1960

St. Michael and the Angels. Rockford, III.: Tan Books and Publishers, 1983; first Published, 1977.

www.americancatholic.org/features/saintofday/deault.asp

www.catholic.org/saints

www.catholic-pages/dir/saints