"For the first time after thousands of years God, in His wisdom and power and love, created again a human being in that state in which He had created our first parents. Immaculate Virgin, you are that human being. Because of sanctifying grace infused into your soul, you were from the first moment of your existence most intimately united with God and endowed with the most precious gifts of heaven. You possessed a perfect faith, a firm hope, a burning love, a deep humility, a purity greater than that of the angels."
from Mary My Hope by Father Lawrence G. Lovasik
Happy Feast Day, Oh Blessed Mother
7 comments:
Best Festal wishes to you.
Happy Feast Day to you, Rosemary!
--Denise
Happy feast day! Blessings, Sarah
Father Lovasik is such a beautiful writer! Happy Feastday still! :)
Rosemary, you have to explain to me what the feast of the immaculate conception is. It sound like a celebration of Mary. It sound very beautiful.
What do you do for the feast? It sounds like a wonderful way to keep the true spirit of Christmas vivid in our minds!
Lynz, for us it's a holy day of obligation and, yes, it's an honoring of Mary. On holy days we are obligated to attend Mass and to treat the day like a Sunday-- meaning we are not to do unnecessary work. The Mass is a special Mass that shows the honor we give to Mary. (not worship, honor!) as the mother of Jesus. As a family, we also said the rosary which is a prayer that honors Mary and also asks for her intercession. (we ask her to pray for us.)
Other than that there are no set traditions.
Oh! What we are honoring on this particular Marian feast is that Mary was born without original sin. This is a teaching of the Catholic Church and was also a belief among even the earliest Christians. We believe that while we are washed clean from original sin by our Baptism, Mary was protected from ever being effected by it, because of the exalted position she was to have as the mother of Jesus-- as one who actually carried Jesus within her.
If anybody else wants to add to this, feel free. It's not an easy concept to understand and I know I've greatly simplified it. Maybe I'll post more about it later. Thanks for asking, Lynz!
That is a great explination. Thank you for sharing! Sunday is my favorite day of the week, so treating another day like Sunday sound beautiful!
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