MARY AND THE CHURCH - I

 

 

May is the month that is traditionally given over by devout Catholics to special veneration of the Blessed Virgin Mary and to an annual period of reflection on her particular place in God's economy and His plan for the salvation for the human race. From the most ancient period of Christianity down through the centuries, the mystery of Mary always was joined in thought and meditation to the mystery of the Catholic Church. This was illustrated most vividly during the Second Vatican Council, when the Fathers of the Council on October 29, 1963, voted to incorporate the doctrine they intended to teach about the Blessed Virgin Mary into the principal document of that Council, which is the Dogmatic Constitution on the Church. The entire eighth chapter of that dogmatic constitution concerns Mary and her relationship with Christ and with His Church. It was in his closing allocution at the end of the third session of that Ecumenical Council, on November 29, 1964, that Pope Paul VI officially bestowed on Mary the title, "Mother of the Church".
Pope Leo XIII, quoting Berengard, a Church Father, had noted that while "Mary belongs to the Church and, in a sense, is the Church's daughter, it is also true, at an even deeper level, that she can be called the Mother of the Church." Bruno of Asti remarked that, "Since she is the daughter of Jerusalem who is our mother from on high, she must then be the Mother of the Church which we constitute." Bossuet called Mary "the Mother of the New People of God", and Saint Ephrem said, "Mary is the earth in which the Catholic Church was sown."
The Catechism of the Catholic Church states, "By her complete adherence to the Father's will, to His Son's redemptive work, and to every prompting of the Holy Spirit, the Virgin Mary is the Church's model of faith and charity. Thus she is, (as the Second Vatican Council claims), a preeminent and wholly unique member of the Church. Indeed, she is the exemplary realization of the Church."

 

 

The Catechism goes on to call Mary "the eschatological icon of the Church", saying, "After speaking of the Church, her origin, mission, and destiny, we can find no better way to conclude than by looking to Mary. In her we contemplate what the Church already is in her mystery on her own pilgrimage of faith, and what she will be in the homeland at the end of her journey. There in the glory of the most holy and undivided Trinity, in the communion of all the saints, the Church is awaited by the one she venerates as the Mother of the Lord and her own Mother." The Second Vatican Council remarks, "In the meantime the Mother of Jesus, in the glory which she possesses in body and soul in heaven, is the image and beginning of the Church as the Church is to be perfected in the world to come. Likewise she shines forth on earth until the day of the Lord shall come, a sign of certain hope and comfort for the People of God."
Father Olier said, "The holy Religion of Jesus Christ has its beginning in the secrecy of the heart of the most holy Virgin." Pope Saint Leo the Great, citing Saint Augustine, noted that Mary conceived Christ in her heart before she conceived Him in her womb. Father Passaic remarked, "When, as the silent Mother of the silent Word, Mary held blindly in her life to the mysteries of God, watching all things and keeping them and pondering them in her heart, (Luke 1:29 & 1:51), she prefigured that long train of memory and intense meditation which is the very soul of the Sacred Tradition of the Church."

 

VIRGIN & MOTHER


 

Saint Mary, who was present by God's providence with the Apostles when the Holy Spirit came down upon the incipient Church which Christ founded (Acts of the Apostles 1:14), is the model and image of the Catholic Church both in her unsullied virginity and in her divine maternity. Honorius of Autun wrote, "The glorious Virgin Mary stands for the Church, Who is also both a virgin and mother. The Catholic Church is a mother because every day she presents God with new children in Baptism, made fruitful by the Holy Spirit. At the same time she is a virgin because God does not allow her to be in any way corrupted by the defilement of heresy and false doctrine, since she preserves inviolate the integrity of the faith."
Carl Feckes stated, "As Mary bore the earthly Christ, so the Church bears the Eucharistic Christ. As the whole life of Mary is centered upon bringing up and protecting Christ, so again the deep life and solicitude of the Church are centered on the Holy Eucharist. As Mary gives the earthly Christ to the world and from this Gift are born the children of God, so also the Eucharistic Flesh and Blood made present by the Church form the living children of God. As Mary offered up Christ together with Himself at the foot of the cross, so the whole Church, at every Mass, offers His sacrifice with Himself to the heavenly Father."
Isaac of l'Etoile wrote, "Our Lady and the Church both give to God the Father a posterity. Mary, sinless gave the Mystical Body a Head, while the Church, in the remission of sins, (John 20:23), gives the Head its Body (Ephesians 1:22-23). Both are thus the Mother of Christ, but they bear Him not one without the other."

 

REDEEMED

 


In speaking about the Blessed Virgin Mary, it is well to stress, in order to avoid any undue exaggerations, that, although she is the most eminent and important member of the Church and greatest of all creatures that have come from the hand of God, she is still "one of the vast family of the redeemed". As for each of us, God is also her Savior (Luke 1:47) and all her greatness comes only "from the redemption which is in Christ Jesus". Our Redeemer is her Savior. Like all of us, she was in need of grace and mercy which could only come from God. She was included in the "sentence incurred by the sin of Adam and involved in his debt just like us, but because of Him Who was to redeem us on the cross, the debt was remitted her by anticipation".
As Blessed Pope Pius IX observed, "She is redeemed like ourselves but in a manner altogether different, a manner more sublime." Preserved free from sin from the instant of her conception in the womb of Saint Ann, her mother, God filled her with grace (Luke 1:28) "so that His divine Son might be born of her and with Him the Church in her wholeness...For it was in her womb that the universal Church was betrothed to the Word and united to God by an eternal alliance." As Pope John Paul II noted, "It can be clearly seen how the relationship between Mary and the Church is a fascinating comparison between two mothers." Because the Catholic Church "does the will of God" and "hears the word of God and acts on it", she, like Mary, is called by Christ Himself His Mother (Luke 8:21; Matthew 12;50; Mark 3:35)

 

 

At the beginning of his pontificate more than a quarter of a century ago, Pope John Paul II wrote, "Since Pope Paul VI, inspired by the teaching of the Second Vatican Council, proclaimed the Mother of Christ to be the Mother of the Church, and that title has become known far and wide, may it be permitted to his unworthy successor to turn to Mary as Mother of the Church... She is the Mother of the Church because, on account of the eternal Father's ineffable choice and due to the Spirit of Love's special action, she gave life to the Son of God, for Whom and by Whom all things exist (Hebrews 2:10), and from Whom the whole People of God receives the grace and the dignity of election. Her Son explicitly extended His Mother's maternity in a way that could be easily understood by every soul and every heart, by designating, when He was raised on the cross, His beloved disciple as her son (John 19:26-27)."
"The Holy Spirit inspired her to remain in the Upper Room after our Lord's ascension, recollected in prayer and expectation together with the Apostles, until the day of Pentecost when the Church was to be born in visible form, coming forth from darkness (Acts of the Apostles 1:14). Later all the generations of disciples, of those who confess and love Christ, like the Apostle John, spiritually took this Mother into their homes, and she was thus included in the history of salvation and in the Church's mission from the very beginning...."

 

IDIOMS

 


The German theologian Sheeben, has noted, "Mary is figured in the Church and the Church is figured in Mary. There is, in fact, a constant mutual exchanging and interpenetration between the two, which provides for a certain exchange of idioms." Cardinal Henri de Lubac researched how, from the early years of the Church through the High Middle Ages, the same biblical symbols in the Church's Tradition are applied to both Mary and the Catholic Church with "ever increasing profusion". Both the Catholic Church and our Lady are called the new Eve, the Mother of all the spiritually living, the tree of Paradise Whose fruit is Christ, the Ark of the New Covenant, Jacob's Ladder, the Gate of heaven, the Fleece of Gideon, the Tabernacle of the most High, the Throne of Solomon, the valiant Woman of the Book of Proverbs, and the Sign in heaven and the Crusher of the serpent from the Book of Revelation and the Book of Genesis.
Other titles bestowed equally on Mary and on the Catholic Church are: the Garden enclosed, the sealed Fountain, the Tower of David, the immaculate Virgin and City surrounded by angels, the Mystical Vine, the Scepter of orthodoxy, the new Earth, the Dawn heralding the Day of Salvation, the Bush that burns but is not consumed, etc. Father Charles de Journet noted that in Mary the whole Church is outlined, since she comprises in an eminent degree all the graces and perfections of the Church. Paul Claudel remarked that "it is from Mary and the Church, forever in place before His gaze, that the Eternal takes the measure of all things." REMARKS Saint Ambrose said, "Our Lady shows forth in herself the figure of holy Church." Some more modern writers have called the Blessed Virgin Mary "the ideal figure of the Church" and "the mirror in which the whole Church is reflected". She is "the type and model of the Church in point of origin and perfection". The "form of our Mother the Catholic Church is according to the form of the Mother of Jesus." Our present Holy Father has written, "Mary is totally dependent upon God and completely directed toward Him. At the side of her Son, she is the most perfect image of freedom and of the liberation of humanity and of the universe. It is to her as Mother and model that the Church must look in order to understand in its completeness the meaning of her own mission."
The Bishop of Rome also says, "Built by Christ upon the Apostles, the Church became fully aware of the mighty works of God on the day of Pentecost, when those gathered together in the Upper Room "were all filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak in other tongues as the Spirit gave them utterance" (Acts of the Apostles 2:4). From that moment on there also begins the great journey of faith, the Church's pilgrimage through the history of individuals and peoples, through time and space. We know that at the beginning of this journey Mary is present. We see her in the midst of the Apostles in that Upper Room, prayerfully imploring the Gift of the Holy Spirit (as the Second Vatican Council points out)."
Charles Peguy said, "In her youthful splendor Mary is already the new universe which the Church is yet to be. The long panorama of the People of God climbs slowly and painfully to the peak which our Lady already occupied at a stroke." He also said that we must remember that at the end of time the Church will be ultimately "all fair", in accordance with her destiny as Christ's Spouse, as Mary was by the work of the Holy Spirit from the first moment she sprang into existence.

MAGNIFICAT

 

Pope John Paul II said, "The Virgin Mother is constantly present on the journey of faith of the People of God towards the Light. This is shown in a special way by the Canticle of the "Magnificat" (Luke 1:46-55), which, having welled up from the depths of Mary's faith at the visitation, ceaselessly re-echoes in the heart of the Church down through the centuries. This is proved by its daily recitation in the Liturgy of Vespers (Evening Prayer) and at many other moments of both personal and communal devotion. The Church, which from the beginning has modelled her earthly journey on that of the Mother of God, constantly repeats her words in the "magnificat".
From the depths of the Virgin's faith at the annunciation and the visitation, the Church derives the truth about the God of the covenant, the God Who is mighty and does "great things" for man and Whose name is holy. The Church, which even amidst trials and tribulations does not cease repeating with Mary the words of the "magnificat", is sustained by the power of God's truth, proclaimed by her with such extraordinary simplicity. At the same time, by means of this truth about God, the Church desires to shed light upon the difficult and sometimes tangled paths of man's earthly existence. In contrast with the suspicion which the Father of lies sowed in the heart of Eve, the first woman, Mary, whom Tradition is wont to call the new Eve, the true Mother of all the living, boldly proclaims the undimmed truth about the holy and almighty God, Who, from the beginning, is the Source of all gifts..."

MARIAN TONE

 


One of the lesser known but still very important characteristics of the Second Vatican Council is what our present Holy Father, Pope John Paul II, called its "Marian tone". This tone "marked the Council from its beginning". The year after he announced his intention to call the 21st ecumenical council in the Church's history, Blessed Pope John XXIII recommended that the entire Church have "recourse to the powerful intercession of Mary, Mother of grace, to pray for the Council", and he called the Blessed Virgin Mary "the heavenly patroness of the Council". It was on the Feast of the Purification of Mary in 1962, that Blessed John XXIII issued a command that the Council should begin on October 11th, of that year, explaining that he chose that date because it was the anniversary of what the Ecumenical Council of Ephesus did on that date in the year 431 A.D., which was to declare and proclaim that Mary was validly and legitimately to be called "Theotokos" or "Mother of God". In his opening address to the Second Vatican Council Blessed John XXIII said that he "entrusted the Council itself to Mary, the Help of Christians, the Help of Bishops, imploring her motherly assistance for the successful outcome of the Council's work."
Pope John Paul II noted that "the Council Fathers also turned their thoughts expressly to Mary in their message to the world at the opening of the Council's sessions, when they said: We, the successors of the Apostles, joined together in prayer with Mary, the Mother of Jesus, form one apostolic body. Thus, they linked themselves, in communion with Mary, to the early Church awaiting the Holy Spirit (Acts of the Apostles 1:14)." The Holy Father then goes on to say, "The exposition about Mary in chapter eight of the Dogmatic Constitution on the Church clearly shows that terminological precautions did not prevent a very rich and positive presentation of basic doctrine, an expression of faith and love for Mary, whom the Church acknowledges as Mother and model."

 

CANTICLE OF CANTICLES

 

The Book of the Bible called the "Canticle of Canticles" or the "Song of Songs" (which is a Hebrew expression meaning the greatest of all songs) is a poem about ideal human love, describing the depth and sacredness of the married union of a man and woman. However, in the light of the New Testament, Catholic Tradition has always interpreted the message of that Book as mainly talking about the nuptial union between Christ and the Catholic Church, having within it a symbol as well of the union of Jesus and the individual Christian soul and of the Holy Spirit placing the Blessed Virgin Mary in the history of salvation (Matthew 9:15; John 3:29; 2 Corinthians 11:2; Ephesians 5:23-32; Revelation 19:7).
Father Louis-Francis d'Argenten wrote, "Since it is true that the Holy Church is the well-beloved Spouse of Jesus Christ, Who speaks to her in the sacred Canticle, and similarly that all the souls who make up a part of this Church may speak to Him as the whole does of which they are a part, it is most certain that the most holy Virgin, who is the first and noblest among the souls that make up the Church, she who has the highest worth in herself alone and who is more beloved by God and more favored with His grace than all the rest of the Church together, is truly that dear Spouse, that dove, that unique and incomparable one to whom the whole Canticle is addressed. That is why the authoritative commentators give three senses to all the words of the Song of Songs: the one concerning the Church in general, the other concerning each soul in particular, and the third, which is apparently the principal one, concerning the most holy Virgin."
Geoffrey of Admont wrote, "All the mysteries of this Book fit perfectly either the Universal Church or each faithful soul in the bosom of the Church, conveying in a spiritual manner the mutual love of Bridegroom and Bride. They nevertheless seem to fit more specially the Blessed Virgin Mary, who, above all souls, was full of special love and grace and deserved above all to be specially loved by the divine Bridegroom."

 

LINKAGE

 


Pope Paul VI, who presided over the Second Vatican Council after the death of Blessed John XXIII, linked the thought of the Council with the Canticle of Canticles, joining the image of the Blessed Virgin Mary with the reality of the Church in his great Apostolic Exhortation entitled "Marialis Cultus". There he called Mary the perfect model of the Catholic Church at worship and prayer. Pope John Paul II remarked that this assertion of his predecessor "is a corollary to the truth that points to Mary as a paradigm for the People of God on the way to holiness."
"That the Blessed Virgin is an exemplar in this field derives from the fact that she is recognized as the excellent exemplar of the Church in the order of faith, charity, and perfect union with Christ, that is, of that interior disposition with which the Church, the beloved Spouse, closely associated with her Lord, invokes Christ, and through Him worships the eternal Father."
Saint Ephrem said the "whole Church rejoices in the Blessed Virgin and participates in her privileges. Together with her the whole Church hears the call of the Bridegroom in the Canticle, Come from Libanus, and she replies, Come

 let us go forth...across the centuries towards the consummation (Revelation 22:20)."

 

THE COUNCIL

 


Pope John Paul II writes, "After proclaiming Mary a "preeminent member", the "type" and "model" of the Church, the Second Vatican Council said: "The Catholic Church, taught by the Holy Spirit, honors her with filial affection and piety as a most beloved mother..... Devotion to the Blessed Virgin, as it always existed, although completely singular, differs essentially from the cult of adoration which is offered to the incarnate Word, as well as to the Father and the Holy Spirit, but is most favorable to that cult, adoring God alone." The Holy Father says, "There is a continuity between Marian devotion and the worship given to God. The honor paid to Mary is ordered to and leads to adoration of the most Blessed Trinity." The Council taught, "The various forms of piety towards the Mother of God, which the Church, within the limits of sound and orthodox doctrine, according to the conditions of time and place and the nature and ingenuity of the faithful, has approved, bring it about that while Mary is honored, her Son, through Whom all things have their being (Colossians 1:15-19)...is rightly known, loved, and glorified and all His commands are observed."