“Happy Birthday Mama Mary”
©2013 James Dacey, Jr. OFS
Hail Mary,
full of grace. The Lord is with thee.
Blessed art thou amongst women,
and blessed is the fruit of thy womb, Jesus.
Holy Mary, Mother of God,
pray for us sinners,
now and at the hour of our death. Amen.
Blessed art thou amongst women,
and blessed is the fruit of thy womb, Jesus.
Holy Mary, Mother of God,
pray for us sinners,
now and at the hour of our death. Amen.
My Friends,
Today is a most splendid day to celebrate. Today we celebrate Mary, Mother of God, born to her parents Saint Anne and Saint Joachim. Here are some findings I’d like to share with you in regards to Mama Mary’s Birth and some wonderful saintly quotes about our dear precious beloved Blessed Mother.
BIRTH OF MARY - Feast - September 8
This feast is connected with the basilica constructed in the fifth century on the site of the pool at Bethesda. This is the supposed home of Ann and Joachim and where the basilica of St. Ann stands today. The feast was introduced by Pope Sergius I around 701. There are apocryphal accounts of Mary's birth, such as the gospel of pseudo-Matthew and another by St. Jerome. This feast opens the liturgical year in the East and was celebrated with an octave by Pope Innocent IV and with a vigil under Pope Gregory XI.
St. Augustine connects Mary's birth with Jesus' saving work. St. Augustine tells the earth to rejoice and shine forth in the light of her birth. “She is the flower of the field from whom bloomed the precious lily of the valley. Through her birth the nature inherited from our first parents is changed.”
REDEMPTORIS MATER – Pope John Paul II
3. The circumstance which now moves me to take up this subject once more is the prospect of the year 2000, now drawing near, in which the Bimillennial Jubilee of the birth of Jesus Christ at the same time directs our gaze towards his Mother. In recent years, various opinions have been voiced suggesting that it would be fitting to precede that anniversary by a similar Jubilee in celebration of the birth of Mary.
In fact, even though it is not possible to establish an exact chronological point for identifying the date of Mary's birth, the Church has constantly been aware that Mary appeared on the horizon of salvation history before Christ. It is a fact that when "the fullness of time" was definitively drawing near-the saving advent of Emmanuel- she who was from eternity destined to be his Mother already existed on earth. The fact that she "preceded" the coming of Christ is reflected every year in the liturgy of Advent. Therefore, if to that ancient historical expectation of the Savior we compare these years which are bringing us closer to the end of the second Millennium after Christ and to the beginning of the third, it becomes fully comprehensible that in this present period we wish to turn in a special way to her, the one who in the "night" of the Advent expectation began to shine like a true "Morning Star" (Stella Matutina). For just as this star, together with the "dawn," precedes the rising of the sun, so Mary from the time of her Immaculate Conception preceded the coming of the Savior, the rising of the "Sun of Justice" in the history of the human race.
Quotes about Mama Mary…
“Never be afraid of loving the Blessed Virgin too much. You can never love her more than Jesus did.” ~St. Maximilian Kolbe
“We never give more honor to Jesus than when we honor his Mother, and we honor her simply and solely to honor him all the more perfectly. We go to her only as a way leading to the goal we seek – Jesus, her Son.” ~St. Louis Marie de Montfort, True Devotion to the Blessed Virgin
“Mary, my dearest Mother, give me your heart so beautiful, so pure, so immaculate so full of love and humility that I may receive Jesus as you did – and go in haste to give him to others.” ~Blessed Mother Teresa
“To serve the Queen of Heaven is already to reign there, and to live under her commands is more than to govern.” ~St. John Marie Vianney
“Thus Christ by being born of a virgin, who, before she knew Who was to be born of her, had determined to continue a virgin, chose rather to approve, than to command, holy virginity. And thus, even in the female herself, in whom He took the form of a servant, He will that virginity should be free.” ~St. Augustine, On Holy Virginity
“As mariners are guided into port by the shining of a star, so Christians are guided to heaven by Mary” ~St. Thomas Aquinas
“And by a new nativity [Christ] was begotten, conceived by a Virgin, born of a Virgin, without paternal desire, without injury to the mother’s chastity…The origin is different by the nature like: not by intercourse with man but by the power of God was it brought about: for a Virgin conceived, a Virgin bare, and a Virgin she remained.” ~St. Leo the Great, Sermons
“A gentleman of the Protestant faith, the son-in-law of Malcolm Muggeridge, told me: “I love you, your work, everything I see, but there is one thing I do not understand: Our Lady. You are full of Mary.” I replied to him: “No Mary, no Jesus –no mother, no.” A few months later he send me a card with these words printed in big letters: “I believe, no Mary, no Jesus! This has changed my life.”” ~Blessed Teresa of Calcutta
“If through faith Mary became the bearer of the Son given to her by the Father through the power of the Holy Spirit, while preserving her virginity intact, in that same faith she discovered and accepted the other dimension of motherhood revealed by Jesus during his messianic mission. One can say that this dimension of motherhood belonged to Mary from the beginning that is to say from the moment of the conception and birth of her Son. From that time she was “the one who believed.”” ~Blessed John Paul II, Mother of the Redeemer 21
“If there is an apostle on whom our eyes would be fixed, was likely to teach us about the Blessed Virgin, it is St. John, to whom she was committed by our Lord on the cross – with whom, as tradition goes, she lived at Ephesus till she was taken away. This anticipation is confirmed; for, as I have said above, one of the earliest and fullest of our informants concerning her dignity, as being the Second Eve, is Irenaeus, who came to Lyons from Asia Mino and had been taught by the immediate disciples of St. John.” ~Blessed Cardinal John Henry Newman
“Now I seem to be penetrating what was the martyrdom of our most beloved Mother…Oh, if all people would but penetrate this martyrdom! Who could succeed in suffering with this, yes, our dear Coredemptrix? Who would refuse her the good title of Queen of Martyrs?” ~St. Padre Pio of Pietrelcina
“In that first ‘fusion’ with Jesus (holy communion), it was my Heavenly Mother again who accompanied me to the altar for it was she herself who placed her Jesus into my soul.” ~St. Therese of Lisieux
Your brother in Christ
Jesus
And His Most Blessed Mother,
Jim (The Rosary Man) Dacey Jr OFS
And His Most Blessed Mother,
Jim (The Rosary Man) Dacey Jr OFS
