Christus Resurrexit,
Sicut Dixit, Alleluia!!!
Christ has Risen,
as He said He would, Alleluia!!!
The Season of Easter is a particular time to rejoice in the Church. We will hear for the next 7 weeks’ readings from the Acts of the Apostles. This is not to take the focus and emphasis off of Jesus’ Glorious Resurrection in any way. In fact, it is precisely to highlight Christ’s Resurrection that we hear about what the new life in Christ through the Holy Spirit does in the life of the faithful disciple and forgiven community. It changes us, motivates us, moves us outward with the Good News, the Greatest Possible News: The Lord is Risen as He said He would. An in Him, we live, now and forever!
Rejoicing in the Church, it is natural to rejoice in the One who embodies the Church – Mother Mary. In this month of May, we the Church, rightly and fittingly Rejoice in Mary, the Church Incarnate. Who better demonstrates what a life filled with Jesus Christ through the Holy Spirit looks like but Mother Mary. She is the perfect disciple. She is the one who has first and forever experienced God’s Mercy and cleansing from Eve’s first sin. She is our greatest Glory after Christ.
St Augustine says, “At once virgin and mother, Mary is the symbol and the most perfect realization of the Church: “the Church indeed. . . by receiving the word of God in faith becomes herself a mother. By preaching and Baptism she brings forth sons, who are conceived by the Holy Spirit and born of God, to a new and immortal life. She herself is a virgin, who keeps in its entirety and purity the faith she pledged to her spouse.” (CCC 507).
“Mary's role in the Church is inseparable from her union with Christ and flows directly from it. “This union of the mother with the Son in the work of salvation is made manifest from the time of Christ's virginal conception up to his death” (LG 57); it is made manifest above all at the hour of his Passion: Thus the Blessed Virgin advanced in her pilgrimage of faith, and faithfully persevered in her union with her Son unto the cross. There she stood, in keeping with the divine plan, enduring with her only begotten Son the intensity of his suffering, joining herself with his sacrifice in her mother's heart, and lovingly consenting to the immolation of this victim, born of her: to be given, by the same Christ Jesus dying on the cross, as a mother to his disciple, with these words: "Woman, behold your son” (LG 58; cf. Jn 19:26-27).
After her Son's Ascension, Mary ‘aided the beginnings of the Church by her prayers’ (LG 69). In her association with the apostles and several women, “we also see Mary by her prayers imploring the gift of the Spirit, who had already overshadowed her in the Annunciation” (LG 59)… also in her Assumption” (CCC 964-965).
Honoring Mary, honor’s Jesus Christ who loved her completely as His Mother in whom the Holy Spirit dwelt. She is our great guide, intercessor, aid, and mother. May we too love deeply and show our love by our life for Christ in the Church under Mother Mary.
Holy Family School will host May Crowing on Friday May 13 at the 8a School Mass
Christ is risen, as He said He would, Alleluia!
Holy Family, Watched over & Cared for by Mary, Pray for us.
~ Fr Jeremy M. Gries