December 12
Feast of Our Lady of Guadalupe
“The Word of God is present in [Mary], dwells within her, and takes hold of all the capabilities of her intelligence, her heart, her sensibility. Her entire being is mobilized by God and for God.”
-Father Marie-Dominique Philippe, O.P.
December 11
“Waiting patiently in expectation is the foundation of the spiritual life.”
-Simone Weil
December 10
“And when the hour had come that was to move
The long days onward to Bethlehem…
a moment paused,
Above a quiet place, and found, just this,
A woman wrapped in silence, and the seed
Of silence was her heart that tried to give
All that it held to give, and ever more.”
-John W. Lynch, Excerpt from A Woman Wrapped in Silence
December 9
“The Father of mercies willed that the Incarnation should be preceded by assent on the part of the predestined mother, so that just as a woman had a share in the coming of death so also should a woman contribute to the coming of life.’
-Lumen Gentium #56
December 8
Feast of the Immaculate Conception of Mary
Mary Immaculate
“Pure as the snow,” we say. Ah! never flake
Fell through the air
One-tenth as fair
As Mary’s soul was made for Christ’s dear sake.
Virgin Immaculate,
The whitest whiteness of the Alpine snows,
Beside thy stainless spirit, dusky grows.
“Pure as the stars.” Ah! never lovely night
Wore in its diadem
So pure a gem
As that which fills the ages with its light.
Virgin Immaculate,
The peerless splendors of they soul by far
Outshine the glow of heaven’s serenest star.
-Eleanor C. Donnelly
December 7
“Within the sphere of humanity and in the natural world, there had to be a pure and spotless being capable of receiving the divine element, a feminine principle enlightened by grace.”
-Nicholas Berdyaev
December 6
“God the Father communicated to Mary His fruitfulness, inasmuch as a mere creature was capable of it, in order that He might give her the power to produce His Son and all the members of His Mystical Body.”
-St. Louis Grignion de Montfort
December 5
“Surrender to God is the only absolute power with which creature is endowed.”
-Gertrud von le Fort
December 4
“Mary is the attentive Virgin, who receives the word of God with faith, that faith which in her case was the gateway and path to divine motherhood, for, as St. Augustine realized, “Blessed Mary by believing conceived Him [Jesus] whom believing she brought forth.”
-Pope Paul VI, Marialis Cultus
December 3
“To be a field for the word means to be earth which allows itself to be absorbed by the seed, which assimilates itself to the seed, renouncing itself so as to make the seed germinate. With her motherhood Mary transfused into it her very substance, body and soul, so that a new life might come forth…Mary makes herself completely available as the soil, she allows herself to be used and consumed so as to be transformed into him.
-Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger (Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI) on Mary’s motherhood
