THEOTOKOSMOTHER OF GOD

Mary, Mother of GodAll Christians believe that Jesus was born

of the Blessed Virgin Mary.Jesus has two natures,

divine and human, yet he is one divine Person

Since this one divine person was born of Mary

she really is the Mother of the one divine person,

The Mother of God. To deny this is to deny

the Incarnation

Scripture TeachesElizabeth calls Mary

“mother of my Lord.”(Lk 1:43)

“Behold a virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and his name shall be called Emanuel, which means God with

us.”(Mt 1:23)

“the child to be born will be called holy, the Son of God.” (Lk 1:35)

“when the time had fully come, God sent forth his Son, born of woman.”

(Gal 4:4)

Early Fathers ConfirmIgnatius of Antioch (110)

“For our God, Jesus Christ, was conceived by Mary in accord with God’s plan”

Irenaeus of Lyons (180-190)“The Virgin Mary, being obedient to His Word, received from an angel the glad tidings that she

would bear God.”Council of Ephesus (431)

This council condemned as heresy the teaching of Nestorius that Jesus is two distinct persons,

and that Mary is the mother of the human person only.

Correct belief about Mary preserves correct belief about Jesus.

Protestant Reformers InsistMartin Luther

“Not only was Mary the mother of Him who is born in Bethlehem but of Him who, before the world , was eternally born of the father, from a

Mother in time and at the same time man and God.”John Calvin

“It cannot be denied that God in choosing and destining Mary to be the Mother of His Son, granted her the highest honor. Elizabeth calls

Mary Mother of the Lord, because the unity of the person in the two natures of Christ was such that she could have said that the mortal

man engendered in the womb of Mary was at the same time the eternal God”

Ulrich Zwingli“It was given to her what belongs to no creature, that in the flesh she

should bring forth the Son of God.”

Why do Catholics honor Mary?

• Mary is completely devoted to the will of God

• Mary is neither a timid nor a submissive woman

• She openly proclaimed God’s vindication of the humble and oppressed in the Magnificat

• She experienced poverty and suffering, flight and exile, death of loved ones

• Her action and strength gave witness to and helped strengthen the apostolic community

God honored Mary above all creatures by making

her the mother of his Son.

(Lk 1:28,30)In honoring Mary the

Catholic Church is following the example

of GodLuke 1:26-56

• The Archangel Gabriel shows Mary great honor

• Elizabeth “filled with the Holy Spirit” calls Mary blessed.

• Mary herself prophesies that all ages will call her blessed.

Why do Catholics honor Mary?

Jesus Christ, the Son of God honors Mary

(Jn 2:1-11)The first disciples

honor her(Acts 1:14)

The early Christian Church honored Mary(150CE Catacomb art)If we Love Jesus we

love his motherThe question should

be:

How can anyone not honor Mary?Why do Catholics honor Mary?

How do Catholics honor Mary?• “hyperdulia”--veneration of

Mary vs. “latria”--worship of God

• “fiat”--She fully and freely accepted the will of God and acted upon it.

• Charity and service were the driving force of her actions.

• She was first and most perfect of Christ’s disciples

The Annunciation is the beginning of Motherhood

The fact of the Annunciation of the Blessed Virgin Mary is related in Luke 1:26-38.

The Evangelist tells us that in the sixth month after the conception of St. John the Baptist by

Elizabeth, the angel Gabriel was sent from God to the Virgin Mary, at Nazareth, a small town in the

mountains of Galilee. Mary was of the house of David, and was espoused

to Joseph, of the same royal family. She had, however, not yet entered the household of

her spouse, but was still in her mother's house, working, perhaps, over her dowry.

(Bardenhewer, Maria Verk., 69).

The Annunciation

And the angel having taken the figure and the form of man, came into the house and said to her:

"Hail, full of grace (to whom is given grace, favored one),

the Lord is with thee." Mary having heard the greeting words did not speak;

she was troubled in spirit, since she knew not the angel, nor the cause of his coming,

nor the meaning of the salutation.

The Annunciation

And the angel continued and said: "Fear not, Mary, for thou hast found grace with God.

Behold thou shalt conceive in thy womb, and shalt bring forth a son;

and thou shalt call his name Jesus. He shall be great,

and shall be called the Son of the Most High; and the Lord God shall give unto him the throne of

David his father; and he shall reign in the House of Jacob forever.

And of his kingdom there shall be no end."

The Virgin understood that there was question of the coming

Redeemer. But, why should she be elected

from amongst women for the splendid dignity of being the

mother of the Messiah, having vowed her virginity to God?

(St. Augustine).

Therefore, not doubting the word of God like Zachary, but filled with fear and astonishment,

she said: "How shall this be done, because I

know not man?"

The Annunciation

The angel to remove Mary's anxiety and to assure her that her virginity would be spared, answered: "The Holy Ghost shall come upon thee and the power of the Most High shall overshadow thee.

And therefore also the Holy which shall be born of thee shall be called the Son of God."

In token of the truth of his word he made known to her the conception of St. John, the miraculous pregnancy of her relative now old and sterile:

"And behold, thy cousin Elizabeth; she also has conceived a son in her old age, and this is the sixth

month with her that is called barren: because no word shall be impossible with God."

Mary may not yet have fully understood the meaning of the heavenly message and

how the maternity might be reconciled with her vow of

virginity, but clinging to the first words of the angel

and trusting to the Omnipotence of God she

said:

"Behold the handmaid of the Lord, be it done to me

according to thy word."

The Annunciation

The year and day of the Annunciation cannot be determined as long as new material does not

throw more light on the subject.

The present date of the feast (March 25)

depends upon the date of the older feast of

Christmas.

The Annunciation

The Annunciation is the beginning of

Jesus

in His human nature.

Through His mother

He is a member of the human race.

Many holy fathers (Sts. Jerome, Cyril, Ephrem,

Augustine) say that the consent of Mary was

essential to the redemption. It was the will of God, St. Thomas

says (Summa III:30),

that the redemption of mankind should depend upon the consent of the Virgin

Mary. This does not mean that God in His plans was bound by the will of a creature, and

that man would not have been redeemed, if Mary had not consented.

It only means that the consent of Mary was foreseen from all eternity, and therefore

was received as essential into the design of God.

The Feast of the Annunciation of the

Blessed Virgin Mary (25 March),

also called in old calendars: FESTUM

INCARNATIONIS, INITIUM

REDEMPTIONIS CONCEPTIO CHRISTI,

ANNUNTIATIO CHRISTI,

ANNUNTIATIO DOMINICA.

The Feast of the Annunciation

probably originated shortly before or after the council

of Ephesus (c. 431). At the time of the Synod of Laodicea (372) it was not

known;

St. Proclus, Bishop of Constantinople (d. 446),

however, seems to mention it in one of his homilies.

He says, that the feast of the coming of Our Lord and Savior, when He vested

Himself with the nature of man (quo hominum genus indutus), was celebrated

during the entire fifth century. This homily, however, may not be genuine, or the words

may be understood of the feast of Christmas.

In the Latin Church this feast is first mentioned in the

Sacramentarium of Pope Gelasius (d. 496), which

we possess in a manuscript of the seventh

century; It is also contained in the

Sacramentarium of St. Gregory (d. 604),

one manuscript of which dates back to the eighth

century.

The Feast of the Annunciation

Since these sacramentaries contain

additions posterior to the time

of Gelasius and Gregory, some scholars ascribe the

origin of this feast in Rome to the seventh

century; The tenth Synod of

Toledo (656), and Trullan Synod (692) speak of this feast as one universally celebrated in

the Catholic Church.

The Feast of the AnnunciationAll Christian antiquity

(against all astronomical possibility) recognized the 25th of March as the actual day of

Our Lord’s death. The opinion that the Incarnation also took place on

that date is found in the pseudo-Cyprianic work "De Pascha Computus", c. 240.

It argues that the coming of Our Lord and His death must have coincided with the creation and fall of

Adam. And since the world was created in spring,

the Savior was also conceived and died shortly after the equinox of spring.

Similar fanciful calculations are found in the early and later Middle Ages, and to

them, no doubt, the dates of the feast of the Annunciation and of Christmas owe their

origin. Consequently the ancient martyrologies assign to the

25th of March • the creation of Adam• the crucifixion of Our Lord; • the fall of Lucifer, • the passing of Israel through

the Red Sea • and the immolation of Isaac.

(Thruston, Christmas and the Christian Calendar, Amer. Eccl. Rev., XIX, 568.)

The original date of this feast was the 25th of

March. Although in olden times

most of the churches kept no feast in Lent,

the Greek Church in the Trullan Synod

(in 692; can. 52) made an exception in

favor of the Annunciation.

In Rome, it was always celebrated on the 25th

of March.

This feast was always a holy day of obligation in the Universal Church.

As such it was abrogated first for France and the French dependencies,

9 April, 1802; and for the United States, by the Third Council of

Baltimore, in 1884. By a decree of the S.R.C.,

23 April, 1895, the rank of the feast was raised from a double of

the second class to a double of the first

class.

If this feast falls within Holy Week or Easter Week, its office is

transferred to the Monday after the octave of Easter.

In some German churches it was the custom to keep its office the

Saturday before Palm Sunday if the 25th of March fell in Holy Week. The Greek Church, when the 25th

of March occurs on one of the three last days in Holy Week, transfers

the Annunciation to Easter Monday;

on all other days, even on Easter Sunday, its office is kept together

with the office of the day.

Mary, Mother of God Why do we call Mary the mother of God?

• Because she is the Mother of Jesus she is the Mother of God.

• She is not the source of Jesus’ divine nature but she is the mother of His human nature.

• There was no time that the human Jesus was not God

How is Mary our mother too?

• In John 19:26 the disciple symbolizes all disciples of Christ

• Mary then is seen as Mother of the Church

• Mary is then Queen of Heaven and earth

• Mary continues to persevere in prayer with and for the Church.