Mother of Christ! hear thou thy people’s cry,
Star of the deep, and portal of the sky!
Mother of him who thee from n othing made,
Sinking we strive, and call to thee for aid:
Oh, by that joy which Gabriel brought to thee,
Thou Virgin first and last, let us thy mercy see.
- V. The Angel of the Lord declared unto Mary
- R. And she conceived by the Holy Ghost.
Pour forth we beseech Thee, O Lord, Thy grace into our hearts, that we to whom the Incarnation of Christ, Thy Son, was made known by the message of an angel, may, by His passion and cross, be brought to the glory of his Resurrection; through the same Christ, our Lord. Amen.
I am deeply concerned at this praying to Mary, in addition she is no way the mother of God, she was only the bearer of Jesus’ physical body. Why are you promoting such unbiblical ideas?
“The Son, which is the Word of the Father, begotten from everlasting of the Father,the very and eternal God, of one substance with the Father, took Man’s nature in the womb of the Blessed Virgin of her substance: so that two whole and perfect natures, that is to say, the Godhead and manhood were joined together in one person never to be divided, whereof is one Christ, very God, and very Man”
Article 11 of the Thirty Nine articles of the Church of England
Mary is called the Mother of God because Christ is God.
We can speak to her because God is not the God of the dead but the living. e.g.Jesus spoke with Moses and Elijah.
I think we honour her because she was so honoured by God and, despite her dismay, she honoured God’s will, no matter the personal cost to her. I see her as an example of total trust and I respond to Elizabeth’s greeting, calling her “blessed” and applying the same description to the child she would bear. Mary knew her scriptures and the resulting Magnificat shows that she fully understood her duty to God. What a unique destiny was hers.
It would be a terrible and total denigration to think that God simply “used” Mary and that He was willing to consign her to anonimity. She saw Christ formed and educated, took the utmost care of Him and walked the journey of that unique motherhood, which took her to terrible locations and wracked her soul. Christ Himself knew this and responded with love to her, pronouncing her our Mother too. No, we do not pray to her – we simply respond to her and honour her, as the Lord Our God and His Son honoured her.