An antique icon of the blessed Virgin Mary and the child Jesus.An antique icon of the blessed Virgin Mary and the child Jesus.

A medieval ballad has Mary at the foot of the Cross angrily addressing the Eternal Father with the words: “If I had known that it would end this way, I would not have said yes”. The composer of this irreverent ballad was clearly not conversant with Mary’s innermost attitudes as evidenced in the New Testament.

In Galatians 4:4, St Paul notes that Mary is the very special human ‘place’ God chose for His son to take flesh and enter human history:  “When the time had fully come, God sent His son, born of a woman…”  Jesus came to redeem us, so that we would become God’s adopted sons and daughters (cf. Gal 4:5).

The New Testament gives pride of place to Jesus the Saviour, while also discreetly delineating Mary’s subservient yet vital role in the history of salvation.

Mary, like us, is saved by Jesus, yet “full of grace” (Lk 1:28), having been preserved from original sin through the merits of her divine son.  Invited to enter into the adventure of saving humanity, Mary consented wholeheartedly: “be it done to me according to your word” (Lk 1:38).

Jesus always did what pleased the Father (Jn 8:29) to the point of loving us to the very end (Jn 13:1; 19:30). Mary, his holiest disciple, always did likewise. When a woman said “blessed is the womb that bore you”, Jesus replied: “more blessed still are those who hear the word of God and keep it” (Lk 11:28).

Society badly needs commitment to one’s word, a genuine spirit of service, strength in suffering, compassion and mercy towards others – all Christian virtues admirably embodied in Jesus’ mother

Mary is to be venerated because she is the Mother of God who gave Jesus bodily birth: but she deserves greater praise because she is Jesus’ perfect disciple, saying yes to God perseveringly to the end, like her son.

At Cana, Mary was outstanding in her attentiveness to the needs of others: she interceded for them with her son, obtaining what they needed (Jn 2:3-5). In the role of universal Mother, which the crucified Jesus formally confided to her (Jn 19:26), she now pleads for all her children.

At Calvary, Mary, far from rebelling against God’s plan, suffered profoundly and, associating herself with a mother’s heart, generously consented to the sacrifice of her son (Vatican II, Lumen Gentium, 58).

Eve, along with Adam, disobeyed (Gen 3), becoming the cause of death for the human race. Mary, the new Eve, cooperated with Jesus, the Saviour and new Adam, in bringing new life to the human race.

Jesus’ self-effacing death on the Cross reveals God’s merciful love for us all; through her conscious yes to God’s designs at Calvary, Mary became the Mother of Mercy.

Mary is venerated in the Catholic Church in a special manner in the month of May. Forms of this veneration could be the Rosary, pilgrimages to Marian shrines, contemplation on biblical scenes involving Our Lady, the Angelus prayer and the works of mercy. The important thing here is that the Virgin Mother’s virtues are, with God’s grace, assimilated and then lived out concretely.

Some may mock these religious practices as childish, pious or irrelevant to our day and age. Nothing could be further from the truth.  Society badly needs commitment to one’s word, a genuine spirit of service, strength in suffering, compassion and mercy towards others – all Christian virtues admirably embodied in Jesus’ mother.

Alongside Jesus, the new Adam, Mary is the new Eve, the icon of the true woman to be loved and revered.

Fr Soler is a member of the Society of Jesus.

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