The Power of Our Lady to Teach Us About God

Most people just mumble their prayers without paying much attention to the words.  But the words in the Hail Mary were carefully chosen by St. Luke and added to by the Church Fathers, working under the influence of the Holy Spirit, to proclaim words that coincide with God’s intentions.

These public prayers give praise to God in perfect compliance with the truth behind the words, and they should be prayed exactly as tradition has always prayed them. A good example of God’s intention for our prayer is the Hail Mary. There are ten separate phrases in the Hail Mary that are for our instruction.

Acceptance by angels

The first phrase is the Archangel Gabriel’s greeting to our Lady: “Hail, Mary!” Gabriel was sent to Mary to announce her being chosen by God for a special mission. You would think that someone like a Temple official would be delegated to make the announcement that she would be chosen to be the mother of the Jewish Messiah, but it was not even a human being that was sent, it was an archangel.

Why would God send an angel? Angels are an integral part of God’s creation, and the advent of the Messiah was as important to them as it was to humans. Lucifer (the name means “light-bearer”) was intended to be the bright morning light of creation to angels as well as to humans. He was originally willed by God to help all creatures understand the nature of God better because no created person can fully understand God.

Lucifer, however, rejected that sublime privilege and attempted to ascend to a higher level himself. The Archangel Michael defended the rights of God against Lucifer and the third of the angels who joined in his revolt, and he cast them out of heaven.

The appointment of the Messiah to take over after Lucifer’s rebellion is good news to the angels. I believe the angels rejoiced over the birth of the Savior much more fervently than humans do. They saw the significance of it more clearly than the human mind can grasp.

The role of grace

The second phrase of the prayer is “full of grace.” Grace is another way of describing the dynamic life of God.  His life is full of His goodness, His mercy, His justice. It’s the kind of life all humans should strive for: the life of sanctifying grace.

A life of grace is the opposite of a life marred by sin and concupiscence that compromises the lives of all fallen humans. God’s sanctifying grace is a spiritual condition. Humans can’t see it but angels can. It’s very significant that the angel saw this life of perfect grace in Our Lady.

Mary was the only human descendant of our first parents who was ever conceived without Original Sin.

Mary is the most blessed

The third phrase, “The Lord is with you,” carries so much more meaning because it was uttered by an angel.  The next two phrases “blessed are you among woman” and “blessed is the fruit of your womb Jesus” are also announced by the angel rather than by a human being.  This is significant because the fruit of her womb is the God who created all angels and all humans.

The evil that Lucifer introduced into the world affected angels as well as humans.  God had already corrected the evil influence of Lucifer on the angels before time began. When He became incarnate in the womb of Mary and entered the physical world, He came to correct the evil Lucifer had done to humans. Angels as well as humans rejoiced that Jesus made His entry into this physical world.

Acceptance by humans

When Mary visits Elizabeth to help her in her pregnancy with the Baptist, Elizabeth greets her with the sixth phrase “blessed are you among women,” praise this time from a human. Elizabeth continues with the title “Mother of my Lord.” God infused Elizabeth with recognition that Mary is truly Mother of God because she is the mother of Jesus who is the divine Son of God in human flesh.

The next three phrases, “Pray for us”, “Now”, “and at the hour of our death” were added by the early Church or the Church Fathers because of the understanding that the Blessed Mother intercedes for us throughout our lives, especially at the end.

Mary’s special role

Through this prayer, the commemoration of Mary Queen of Angels and mother of the human race is forever celebrated publicly and in private prayer by angels and humans. Mary is a member of the Mystical Body of Christ, but a member with a special role. She is the mother of Jesus Christ, a divine Person. That makes Mary the mother of God. God in His divine nature has all the influence over His divine Son that a human mother has over her son.

So, one way of understanding the Incarnation is, of course, that the Father is the paternal influence over Jesus, but what we might call the maternal influence of God is now delegated to the mother of Jesus. Mary is the conduit of God’s own maternal influence to the human race. Mary is truly the new Eve, our mother; Jesus is truly the new Adam.

Mary’s perfect compliance

Mary complied with that dignity in a perfect and completely transparent way. She did not exhibit a private agenda of her own over against the Father’s agenda. During the Crucifixion of Jesus, Mary knew that the Father expected Jesus to display His perfect acceptance of His Father’s will that He offer no resistance to those who wanted to kill Him no matter how difficult it was for Him.

Mary also submitted herself perfectly to God’s will. I’m sure the trauma she saw her Son experience must have torn her apart, but she did not try to interfere with it. She was perfectly obedient to the Father’s will no matter how difficult it was. For this reason, the Church calls her the Co-Redemptrix: she and her Son alike displayed total compliance with the Father’s will. Lucifer, on the other hand, refused compliance with God under circumstances where it would have been the easiest thing in the world for him to obey.

Because of her transparency, God is able to manifest His divinity through Mary without any interference from her own self-image or ego. Much of what can be said to be maternal or feminine about God is manifested through the femininity of the Virgin Mary, just as much that can be said to be paternal or masculine about God is manifested through the masculinity of Jesus. And some day in the future, more of the attributes of God will be manifested through us (if we make it into heaven, that is).

Mary did not obscure the window of her soul with her own self-image, so the femininity of God is manifested through Mary’s virginal and pure body in a way that God wants without any distortion on Mary’s part.

For those who find it difficult to relate to what seems to be a patriarchal God, God, through Mary, sets aside all judgmental factors and, with the greatest of feminine tenderness and maternal concern, weeps in sorrow because of our sins. When He draws human beings into His mystical body, He appoints us to special missions to display to others, not our own special ambitions, but some manifestation of things characteristic to God.

The man, Jesus Christ, is truly God because the divine Person operating within His human nature is the Son of God. The woman, Mary, is only a created human being, but God wants her to be the conduit of His maternal interest in what He created.

Displaying God’s attributes

This is a far greater honor than anything the world can offer. God has positions He wants each one of us to hold, if we deserve entrance into heaven that is. He wants each one of us within His Mystical Body, worthless scoundrels that we are or were in this life, to display some attribute of Him to others.

The Mystical Body prods us into a physical display of some of the attributes of God. This body is called mystical because it is a mystery how God sustains the Church. Through it, we become totally dedicated to God and yet still display our own personality and never show the slightest distortion of what God wants.

And like God, love will motivate everything we do. When people look at the Church, they will see much of God displayed partly through you, partly through me, and partly through each person in the Mystical Body.

Humans cannot see God. He is pure spirit; but in God’s heavenly kingdom, all of us will be able to see Him through His Mystical Body. This is the way we know that God is always with us, and through us and within us. If we want to see God and experience God, all we have to do is know where to look.

This is so much better than anyone imagined. And we can be generous with everyone we love because our Father is rich beyond all measure and never stingy.