Who is Mary for us?

Mother of the living, "Noah's Ark" that holds all humanity:

Mary is first and foremost Mother! Of course, she is Mother of all Christians, since Jesus Himself gave his mother to all mankind, by handing her over to his beloved disciple: "This is your mother" (John 19: 27). Mary is also Mother in the hearts of millions - both Christians and non-Christians - on every continent and in every culture. Crowds are irresistibly attracted to Mary by the influence of her universal maternity, her sweetness and her tenderness, and the unspeakable beauty of her purity.

In this way, as "Mother of the Living" and "New Eve", Mary not only "holds the entire Church" as Father René Laurentin has reminded us, but, to use an image of St Alphonsus Liguori, she is "Noah's Ark" and she holds all mankind in her maternal womb. And because she is Mother, Mary is an educator for us all. St. Louis de Montfort once even said that if we let Mary guide us, the path to Jesus is much easier and gentler... Mary is Mother so as to guide us to her Son, the Divine Word, the Eternal Wisdom, the God of Love.

Mary, our sister in humanity, a model for saying "Yes" to each vocation:

The Virgin Mary, like all of us, is God's creature and for this very reason she is "one of us", our sister in humanity... but our Immaculate sister! This is why Mary is our model: she is a model to follow along the path leading to Christ, in our own personal lives. She is a model for the entire Church - a model not only of feminine vocations - Mary is a model of all vocations.

To imitate Mary means to imitate the One who pronounced the words "let it happen to me as you have said" (Lk 1: 37) to the angel Gabriel before he left her. These words are the echo of the perfection of God's creature. She is the perfect Spouse. Since every human vocation before the Lord is a spousal vocation (1): one day we will all be called to pronounce the "let it happen to me", opening up the Kingdom of Heaven.

Mary, our Mother of Mercy, our surest refuge:

How could Mary be our Mother, without being at the same time our refuge and our surest consolation before the face of God? Mary accepted all the children of mankind as her own despite the fact that these children nailed her Son to the Cross! This incredible act made Mary our Mother of Mercy forever!

Her capacity to forgive is boundless and her gifts of diplomacy for the poor sinners have an unprecedented power over God's Heart... She is united in such an intimate manner to both the Person of the Redeemer of humanity and to His work of redemption of sinners. How could the Virgin Mary not be the most tender, the surest and most constant and powerful Mediatrix for all of us of the graces of salvation in Jesus Christ?

________________

(1) "The Vocation of the Creation as a Whole is a Feminine Vocation" by Yves Fauquet, Capuchin Friar, one of the commentators and annotators of the Canon Osty's Bible. He wrote a book in French called Voici et me voici in the Bible (Anne Sigier Editions, Canada).

MDN Team