Since the Vigil Mass will be at 7 p.m. Wednesday, there will not be a 5:30 p.m. Mass.
The observance dates back to the 4th Century. The feast day was instituted in 1854 by Pius IX who peroclaimed: “The most Blessed Virgin Mary, in the first instant of her conception, by a singular grace and privilege granted by almighty God, in view of the merits of Jesus Christ, the savior of the human race, was preserved free from all stain of original sin.”
Note that it is Mary herself who is the Immaculate Conception. The day does not refer to Mary's conceiving Jesus by the Holy Ghost, but to the conception of Mary in the womb of her mother, St. Anne, by Mary's father, St. Joachim. What makes her conception immaculate is not that she was conceived by the Holy Ghost of a virgin, as was Christ Our Lord, but that from the very moment of her conception, she was filled with grace by God, Who knew, in His omniscience, that she would say "yes" to the Angel Gabriel and become the Mother of the Savior. Exactly nine months from this feast day, on September 8, we will celebrate Mary's birthday.
Most of what we know about Mary's parents, SS. Anne and Joachim, is derived from the apocryphal book of St. James and the Gospel of the Nativity of Mary. See the text.
St. Anne is the patron of childless people, pregnant women, and grandmothers (her Feast Day is 26 July); St. Joachim is the patron of grandfathers.
0 comments:
Post a Comment