THE
BLESSED VIRGIN MARY, MOTHER OF GOD: The Door that Leads to Christ.
By Herbert B. Rosana, Ph.D.
My Tribute to Mary, Mother of God.
January 1 is not only the beginning
of the Gregorian calendar but it is also celebrated by the Church as a day of
Solemnity of Mary, Mother of God. A
timely celebration indeed, proceeded by Christmas and the feast of the Holy
Innocents. No one can outshine the
Filipino people for their love and devotion to Mary. Here in the Bicol Region we have one of the
most popular Marian Devotion in the Philippines, the Penafrancia Festival. Pope Pius XII in his radio message to the
International Eucharistic Congress in Manila in 5 December 1954 called the
Philippines, the Kingdom of the Rosary.
We are proud of this distinction.
But beyond this feeling there is a need for us, contemporary Filipino
Catholics, to deepen our faith and understanding of Mary in relation to the
history of salvation so that our devotions will become fruitful and manifest in
our daily lives. Otherwise our devotions
will become empty shells devoid of meaning and fruitfulness. As individual Christians we have the duty to
know our faith, to understand it to the best we can and to possess that ability
to make others understand our faith.
The Blessed Virgin Mary has played an
important role in the life of the church and in the history of Salvation. Sister Thomas Mary, O.P.[i]
In an article described the role of Mary in different epochs of Church
history. In the Early centuries of
Christianity, Mary played a very important role in defining the divinity of Christ
when controversies about the nature of Christ were raging among the Christian
Churches at that time. The early church confronted
the heresies of its time most especially about the nature of Christ. The affirmation and definition of the Motherhood
of Mary vanquished the Heresies of Arius and Nestorius and many other
heresies. It was the council of Ephesus
that invoke the Blessed Virgin Mary and called her, Theotokus. Theotokus means
“God-bearer” or the Mother of God. The
purpose of this definition is to proclaim the human nature of Christ as well as
his divinity. That there is one God in
three Divine Persons. And that Christ is
one person with two natures, divine and human.
The heresies of the early centuries of Christianity were defeated
because of Mary. Her role as defined by
the Church became the instrument of this victory. Thus, putting to an end to the bitter debate
about the Christological controversies of the early centuries. Even in the middle ages, the spread of
devotion to holy rosary of the Virgin Mary put an end to the Albigensian
heresy. St. Dominic de Guzman used the
rosary as a weapon to defeat the arguments of the heretics.
 |
| Our Lady of Salvation. Image Displayed at the Boac Cathedral, Marinduque (Photo by the Author) |
Many artefacts of the early centuries of
Christianity revealed how the early Christians expressed their love and
devotion to the Blessed Virgin Mary.
This is made more eloquent in a passage written and included in the
Liturgy of St. John Chrysostom:
“It is truly
just to proclaim you blessed, O Mother of God, who are most blessed, all pure
and Mother of our God. We magnify you
who are more honourable than the Cherubim and incomparably more glorious than
the Seraphim. You who, without losing
your virginity, gave birth to the Word of God.
You who are truly the Mother of God.” (St. John Chrysostom).[ii]
We read about the role of the Blessed
Virgin Mary in the great Christological controversies of the first centuries of
Christianity. By defining her role in
the history of salvation, the church has saw the Blessed Virgin Mary as the
means to define the connection between the Divine and Human and to define the
nature of Christ, which today we profess in the Nicene Creed. The early Fathers such as Ignatius of
Antioch, St. Justin Martyr, St. Irenaeus, and Tertulian, made mention of Mary
and emphasized her role in the incarnation of Christ to defend the Catholic
faith against the heretics of the time.
Origen was the first to address the Blessed Virgin as Theotokus or
Mother of God. “Sub tuum praesidum” we fly unto Thee, was the oldest extanct phrase
that proves that the early Christians prayed to the Virgin Mary[iii]. This same line was borrowed by St. Bernard of
Clairveux in his prayer in the Memorare.[iv]
The second Vatican Council defined
the role of Mary as the pre-eminent member of the Church, and an archetype of
the Church. In fact this is not a new
doctrine since this has been expounded by ancient Christian theologians like
St. Augustine and others. The role of
the Virgin Mary was like that of Eve, the mother of nations. The Second Vatican Council says, “The Father
of mercies willed that the incarnation should be preceded by the acceptance of
her who was predestined to be the mother of His Son, so that just as a woman
contributed to the death of humankind, so also a woman should contribute to the
restoration of life.”[v] Mary here was portrayed as a mother, the New
Eve. If Christ was the new Adam
according to St. Paul, so Mary is also the new Eve. Thus when contemplating of the beautiful icon
of Our Lady of Perpetual Succour, we see the intimacy of the Mother and her
Child and their role in the redemption of Humankind. In crafting the documents of the Scond
Vatican Coucil, the council fathers struggled how to situate the role of the
Virgin Mary in the documents. One group
would want to have a separate constitution on Mary, while another group wanted
to put a closer bond between Mary and the Church. Our very own, the late Cardinal Rufino
Santos, debated on the floor for the proposition that a separate document be
written for Mary while Cardinal Koenig wanted it integrated into the
constitution about the Church. But
whatever the reasons for these debates it was not a diminution of the role of
Mary but it was a matter of putting things in the context of the History of
Salvation. Mary is our Mother, because
Mary is the Mother of Jesus.
There is a dramaturgy once we put
ourselves in the presence of Calvary, (this is often the imagination I focus on
when I hear Mass), there is Jesus hanging on the Cross, there is Mary grieving
at the foot of the cross, her heart pierced with invisible swords of sorrows
for her Son and there was John, the beloved disciple. As the Scripture tells us:
Now there stood
by the cross of Jesus His mother, and His mother’s sister, Mary the wife of Clopas,
and Mary Magdalene. When Jesus therefore
saw His mother, and the disciple whom He loved standing by, He said to His
mother, “Woman behold your son!” Then he
said to the disciple, “Behold your mother!” And from that hour that disciple
took her to his own home.[vi]
Thus even in the sacred mysteries of the
Eucharist, Mary is there, we can hear Jesus telling us, “Behold your mother.” Mary is our mother, for it was Christ Himself
who said so. Her being the mother of
Jesus was not a coincidence nor an accident as some of our protestant and
fundamentalist friends may say. But it
was planned by God all along. Even
before she was conceived, it was already pre-ordained that she will be the
Mother of Jesus and the mother of all Humankind and it is She together with the
Son who will vanquished and subdue and crushed the head of the serpent-Satan. In
Genesis it is written:
And I will put
enmity between you and the woman, and between your seed and her seed; he shall
bruise you on the head, and you shall bruise him on the heel.[vii]
As a mother Mary continues to pray for
us, she continues to obtain graces for us.
For in God all things live, so Mary our mother lives together with all
the saints. But Mary by her singular
role as Mother of God, is pre-eminent.
She is above the angels and the saints, for she is the New Eve, the Mother
of Humankind and our Mother. Christ Himself is telling us, Son, behold your
Mother! For here we behold our Virgin
Mother as the door leading us to Paradise and to Jesus Himself. Being the first disciple to follow
Jesus. She was the reason by which Jesus
performed the first miracle in Cana, and Mary followed her son and bore all the
pains as a mother. Today we saw her as
the image of the church, pure, triumphant.
The Song of Solomon says:
Who is this that
looks forth like the dawn, fair as the moon, bright as the sun, terrible as an
army with banners?[viii]
The woman who recited this magnificat:
...my soul
exalts the Lord
And my spirit
has rejoiced in God my Savior.
For He has had
regard for the humble state of His bondslave;
For behold, from
this time on all generations will count me blessed.
“For the Mighty
One has done great things for me;
And Holy is His
Name.
And His mercy is
upon generation after generation
Toward those who
fear Him.
“For He has done
mighty deeds with His arm;
He has scattered
those who were proud in the thoughts of their heart.
He has brought
down rulers from their thrones,
And has exalted
those who were humble.
He has filled
the hungry with good things;
And sent the
rich away empty-handed.
And He has given
help to Israel His servant,
In remembrance
of His mercy,
As He spoke to
our Fathers,
To Abraham and
his descendants forever.[ix]
Is now exalted as Queen of Heaven and
Earth, who because of her humility and submission to God’s will has become the
New Eve, mother of Humankind, she who gave birth to the Son of God, has given
birth to us by showing us the way to the new birth, into the Kingdom of God. So
that just as Christ gave Mary to John as Mother, Mary may also become our
Mother. As a tribute to her motherhood
may I share with you this old prayer composed by St. Bernard of Clairvaux:
MEMORARE, O
piisima Virgo Maria, non esse auditum a saeculo, quemquam ad tua currentem
praesidia, tua implorantem auxilia, tua patentem suffragia, esse derelictum.
Ego tali animates confidential, ad te, Virgo Virginum, Mater, curro, ad te veinio,
coram te gemens peccator assisto. Noli
Mater Verbi, verba mea despicere; sed audi propitia et exaudi. Amen.[x]
Pray for us O Holy Mother of God, that
we may be made worthy of the promises of Christ. Amen.
[i]
Sr. Thomas Mary, O.P. Marian Theology up to Vatican II. [web] can be accessed
at: http://www.christendom-awake.org/pages/mcbride/marian-upto2vat.htm
[ii]
Fr. William Saunders, Mary, Mother of God. [web]. EWTN. can be accessed at: http://www.ewtn.com/faith/teachings/maryc1.htm
[iii] Early
Christians.org. The Devotion to the Virgin Mary in the Early Church. [on the
web] can be accessed at: http://www.earlychristians.org/docs_interest/Mary.html
[iv]
Michael Martin. [on the web] can be accessed at: http://www.preces-latinae.org/thesaurus/BVM/Memorare.html
[v]
Lumen Gentium, Chapter VIII, par 56.
[vi]
John 19:25-29 (NKJV).
[vii]
Genesis 3:15 (NASB)
[viii]
Song of Solomon 6:10 (RSV)
[ix] Luke
1:46-55 (NASB)
[x] REMEMBER,
O most gracious Virgin Mary, that never was it known that anyone who fled to
thy protection, implored thy help, or sought thy intercession was left
unaided. Inspired with this confidence,
I fly to thee, O Virgin of virgins, my Mother; to thee do I come; before thee I
stand, sinful and sorrowful. O Mother of the Word Incarnate, despise not my
petitions, but in thy mercy hear and answer me. Amen.
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