MARY, MOTHER OF THE CHURCH

Day 30: June 9

Since 2018, every Pentecost Monday, Mary is celebrated under the title of Mother of the Church, initiated by Pope Francis. All dioceses and parishes officially celebrate this feast, which emphasizes that Mary is both the Mother of Christ and the Mother of the Church. In line with Pope Francis' formal announcement, the memorial of Mary, Mother of the Church, is now obligatory for the entire Roman Rite Church, on the Monday after Pentecost.

In the decree Ecclesia Mater by the then Congregation for Divine Worship published on February 11, 2018, the day of the 160th anniversary of the first apparition of Mary to Bernadette in Lourdes, the pope inscribed a mandatory memorial day in the Roman calendar in homage to Mary, "Mother of the Church." Christians around the world are therefore called to participate in the celebration dedicated to her and to pray to her.

During the first celebration of the Blessed Virgin Mary, Mother of the Church, on May 21, 2018, Pope Francis explained the meaning of this feast: "In the Gospels, whenever we speak of Mary, we speak of the 'Mother of the Church'" (Jn 19, 25-34). And if "even in the Annunciation, the term 'mother' is not used, the context is one of motherhood: the mother of Jesus." "This attitude of motherhood accompanies her work throughout the life of Jesus: she is a mother," he insisted. To the point that, "at the end, Jesus gives her as a mother to his own, in the person of John: 'I am leaving, but here is your mother'." This, then, is "the motherhood of Mary."

Pope Francis is not the first to focus on the ancient figure of Mary as Mother of the Church. In the fifth century, Saint Augustine and Pope Leo the Great already asserted that if Mary is the mother of Jesus, she is also the mother of the Church. In the 20th century, at the conclusion of the Third Session of the Second Vatican Council, on 21 November 1964, Pope Paul VI solemnly recognized the Blessed Virgin Mary as "Mother of the Church, that is to say, Mother of the entire Christian people, both faithful and pastors, who call her most loving Mother". The title of "Mother of the Church" is detailed in the Catechism of the Catholic Church: "Mary's role in the Church is inseparable from her union with Christ and flows directly from it," as stated in article 964.

In the Acts of the Apostles, Mary is in prayer with the Apostles in the Upper Room (Acts 1, 13-14), awaiting the coming of the Holy Spirit which marks the birth of the Church. Celebrating Mary, Mother of the Church, on the Monday of Pentecost, the day when Ordinary Time resumes in the liturgy, signifies that the Church, born of the Holy Spirit in the presence of Mary, is also guided and accompanied throughout history by her presence.

This liturgical novelty introduced by Pope Francis highlights the close link between each baptized person, the entire Church, and the Mother of the Lord. This is the meaning of the preface from The Roman Missal for this memorial day of Mary, Mother of God: "It is truly right and just, our duty and our salvation, always and everywhere to give you thanks, Lord, holy Father, almighty and eternal God, and to proclaim your greatness with due praise, as we honor the Blessed Virgin Mary. Receiving your Word in her Immaculate Heart, she was found worthy to conceive him in her virgin’s womb and, giving birth to the Creator, she nurtured the beginnings of the Church. Standing beside the Cross, she received the testament of divine love and took to herself as sons and daughters all those who by the Death of Christ are born to heavenly life. As the Apostles awaited the Spirit you had promised, she joined her supplication to the prayers of the disciples, and so became the pattern of the Church at prayer. Raised to the glory of heaven, she accompanies your pilgrim Church with a mother’s love and watches in kindness over the Church’s homeward steps, until the Lord’s Day shall come in glorious splendor."

St Justin Russolillo Writes...

"Devotion to Mary is a fast-tracked course of perfection. It is the perfect compendium of all means of salvation, corresponding to the fact that Mary is full of grace and the synthesis of sanctification"

(Opera Omnia, I, 351, quoted in: Luois Caputo, Justinian Anthology, Palisades Park, Vocationist Editions, 2013, p. 70)

Pope Francis' Prayer to Mary,

Mother of the Church and Mother of our faith

Mother, help our faith!

Open our ears to hear God’s word and to recognize his voice and call.

Awaken in us a desire to follow in his footsteps,

to go forth from our own land and to receive his promise.

Help us to be touched by his love, that we may touch him in faith.

Help us to entrust ourselves fully to him and to believe in his love, especially at times of trial, beneath the shadow of the cross, when our faith is called to mature.

Sow in our faith the joy of the Risen One.

Remind us that those who believe are never alone.

Teach us to see all things with the eyes of Jesus, that he may be light for our path. And may this light of faith always increase in us, until the dawn of that undying day, which is Christ himself, your Son, our Lord!

Lumen Fidei (June 29, 2013)