![]() As she herself put it, showing her gratitude, “He who is mighty has done great things for me” (Luke 1:49). Luke tells us that when Elizabeth heard Mary’s greeting she cried out joyfully (inspired by the Holy Spirit) “Blessed art thou among women and blessed is the fruit of thy womb!” Mary was indeed blessed because she was born without sin, and was chosen by God to be the Mother of His Son. (Remember, this was in an era when she couldn’t just hop in a car or a bus to get there!) We can admire Mary’s devotion (as well as her stamina!) in setting out on what must have been an arduous journey to go from Nazareth, where she lived, to a town in Judah where her cousin lived, about 70 miles away. Mary, always willing to be of service, went to visit and help her cousin Elizabeth, who was then pregnant with John the Baptist. The words in Line 3 of the Hail Mary, “Blessed art thou among women,” come up again a little later in Luke’s Gospel (1:42) as her cousin Elizabeth’s greeting to her in the Rosary mystery of the Visitation, depicted in the famous painting by the Italian Renaissance painter Mariotto Albertinelli at right. When we pray to Mary we are also praying through Mary, asking her to intercede with God for us on our behalf. Louis De Montfort once referred to the Blessed Mother (as she is also known) as the “treasurer and dispenser of God’s graces.” Thus, it doesn’t hurt for us to get to know her better through prayer!Īgain, praying the Hail Mary or showing our devotion to her doesn’t mean we are putting her ahead of Jesus, as some might fear. Still, we can, and should, turn to Mary in prayer, for the graces she gives us come from God. Paul once noted, Jesus is the “one mediator of God and men” (1 Tim 2:5). ![]() Irenaeus expressed it, “became the cause of salvation for herself and for the whole human race” in becoming the mother of our Redeemer.Īs St. We do not worship Mary but we honor her in praying the Hail Mary for her crucial role in making our salvation possible. Let us remember she was always there for her Divine Son, from the blessed beginning of His life on earth to its bitter end when she stood at the foot of His cross at the Crucifixion, when he gave up His life for us. Mary was totally devoted to doing God’s will with great love and humility. (She had that in common only with her Son!) She was, in the words of the Baltimore Catechism “without any sin and gifted with every virtue.” Mary was the perfect choice to be the Mother of God in that, although she was human just like the rest of us, she was nonetheless conceived without the stain of original sin (in what we refer to as the dogma of the Immaculate Conception). ![]() Because of that, as we read in John’s Gospel (John 1:14), “the Word was made flesh and dwelt among us.” Her famous response was “Behold the handmaid of the Lord be it done to me according to thy word,” (Luke 1:38) in joyful agreement with the Divine request. The first two lines recall the Archangel Gabriel’s greeting to Mary before he told her that God had chosen her to be the Mother of His Son, Our Lord Jesus Christ! The first part of the Hail Mary (lines 1-4) comes from passages in Luke’s gospel relating to the first two Joyful Mysteries of the Rosary, the Annunication (from Luke 1:28) and the Visitation (from Luke 1:42). He also noted that “as all heaven rejoices when the ‘Hail Mary’ is said, so also do the devils tremble and take flight.” Amen.īlessed Alan de la Roche, a great champion of the Rosary in the 15th century, once said that “When I say Hail Mary, hope is made strong in my breast and the dew of consolation falls on my soul….the angelic salutation is a rainbow in the heavens, a sign of the mercy and grace God has given to the world.” ![]() Holy Mary, Mother of God, Pray for us sinners, Now and at the hour of our death. Hail Mary, full of grace, The Lord is with Thee Blessed art thou among women, And blessed is the fruit of thy womb, Jesus. It is as simple as it is elegant, in any language: The Hail Mary has also been the inspiration for some great musical settings of its text in Latin, most famously in the Ave Maria by Franz Schubert. This wonderful prayer has helped give people the graces, strength, and spiritual protection they’ve needed for hundreds of years. It has inspired much fervent devotion to Jesus and His Blessed Mother. The Hail Mary, sometimes called the “angelic salutation,” is the foundation for such famous prayers such as the Rosary and the Angelus. THIS WEB PAGE IS ALSO AVAILABLE AS A PODCAST HERE. JOIN IN THE 54-DAY ROSARY NOVENA FOR OUR NATION FROM AUGUST 15TH TO OCTOBER 7TH, 2023 HERE! THE SAINT MICHAEL PRAYER AND THE ROSARY ARE ALSO POWERFUL PRAYERS TO HELP US THROUGH VERY TURBULENT TIMES! THE FIVE FIRST SATURDAYS IS A DEVOTION NEEDED NOW MORE THAN EVER! FIND OUT MORE HERE ![]()
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