Christian calendar
Christian calendar is organized around Easter which celebrates the resurrection of Jesus. Easter is "the feast of the feasts". The liturgical year includes all the celebrations which celebrate the Holy Trinity (the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit), the Mother of God (Mary), the angels and the saints. Some feasts are on fixed date (Christmas for example) and others are mobile.
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Time of Advent is just before Christmas (Jesus' birth).
Easter is preceded by the Lent, then by the Holy Week. After Easter come the fifty days from Paschal celebration which last until Pentecost.
All the doctrines of the faith are recapitulated and contemplated by the liturgy (the Common prayer of the Christians). The liturgy has an authority: it is the theology of the certainty and the assertion. It produces fruits of holiness (life as a Christ).
The principal feasts (or periods) are as follows:
1. The Advent, period which precedes Christmas
2. Christmas - the incarnation of the Word (Jsus)
3. The Epiphany (Theophany): Jesus, the Messiah
4. The Lent which is the preparation of Easter
5. The Holy Week
6. Easter, the resurrection of Jesus
7. The Rise of Jesus to the heaven
8. Pentecost : the sending of the Holy Spirit
9. Assumption of Mary to the heaven
10. All Saints' Day
All Souls' Day
The solemnity of All Saints' Day is followed by the day dedicated to the memory of the those that the Church evokes each day in its prayer. The Christians believe that death is only one passage, because Jesus said: "Do not marvel at this; for the hour is coming when all who are in the tombs will hear his voice and come forth, those who have done good, to the resurrection of life, and those who have done evil, to the resurrection of judgment"(John 5, 2829).
Or: "I am the resurrection and the life; he who believes in me, though he die, yet shall he live, and whoever lives and believes in me shall never die" (John 11, 25-26).
And Paul writes in addition:
"As by a man came death, by a man has come also the resurrection of the dead. For as in Adam all die, so also in Christ shall all be made alive. But each in his own order: Christ the first fruits, then at his coming those who belong to Christ. Then comes the end, when he delivers the kingdom to God the Father after destroying every rule and every authority and power. For he must reign until he has put all his enemies under his feet […] If the dead are not raised, "Let us eat and drink, for tomorrow we die" (1 Corinthians 15, 21-34).
Christ, the King
The serie of Sundays of ordinary Time is completed on the imposing vision of Christ King of the Universe. Since his birth, Jesus is considered as King and Lord by the Wise men come from the East:
"wise men from the East came to Jerusalem, saying, "Where is he who has been born king of the Jews? […] and going into the house they saw the child with Mary his mother, and they fell down and worshiped him. Then, opening their treasures, they offered him gifts, gold and frankincense and myrrh" (Matthew 2, 1-12).
When Pilate asks Jesus if he is a king, Jesus agrees on it, because he is the Messiah (that which was anointed), the King of the Jews and of all creation :"We found this man perverting our nation, and forbidding us to give tribute to Caesar, and saying that he himself is Christ a king. " And Pilate asked him, "Are you the King of the Jews?" And he answered him, "You have said so".
When Jesus was crucified, "There was also an inscription over him, This is the King of the Jews" (Lk 23).
Beyond tribulations which will come at the end of times, Bible announces the triumph of Christ and the final success of the creation: "To him be glory and dominion for ever and ever. Amen" (Revelation 1, 6).
In the description of the end of time, Revelation makes the victorious portrait of Christ, that to which the Father gave any power to exert the final Judgment :"Then I saw heaven opened, and behold, a white horse! He who sat upon it is called Faithful and true, and in righteousness he judges and makes war [...] He is called is The Word of God" (19,11-16).
Sacred heart of Jesus
The first Christian generations meditated much on the parabola of the shepherd who gives his life for his ewes. While being presented in the form of a good Shepherd, Jesus revealed with the crowd which listened to it "the thoughts of the heart of God", his intention of mercy.
Later, another biblical image was perceived, that of the open heart of Jesus in cross: expression of the most love, the pierced heart of Jesus, from where water and blood came out, is the means of make understand the fruitfulness of his sacrifice, because it is the source of the sacraments of the Church :
"Since it was the day of Preparation, in order to prevent the bodies from remaining on the cross on the Sabbath (for that Sabbath was a high day), the Jews asked Pilate that their legs might be broken, and that they might be taken away. So the soldiers came and broke the legs of the first and of the other who had been crucified with him; but when they came to Jesus and saw that he was already dead, they did not break his legs. But one of the soldiers pierced his side with a spear, and at once there came out blood and water" (John 19, 31-34).
The birth of Jesus foretold
In the feast of the Annunciation of the Blessed Virgin (Lady-Day), one celebrates the coming and the words of Gabriel angel. He said to Mary,
"You will conceive in your womb and bear a son, and you shall call his name Jesus. He will be great, and will be called the Son of the Most High; and the Lord God will give to him the throne of his father David, and he will reign over the house of Jacob for ever; and of his kingdom there will be no end" (Luke 1, 26-36).
When Gabriel angel appears to her, Mary is in Nazareth, little town in Galilea.
In this event, Mary shows especially her purity, her humility, her faith and her perfect obedience with the project of God. She says indeed: "I am the handmaid of the Lord; let it be to me according to your word" (Luke 1, 38)
This feast is nine months before Christmas. Jesus, the Word made flesh is in the centre of this celebration. The Incarnation for the Redemption summarizes the project of love of God for the men. Incarnation and Redemption are inseparable.
The feast of all the saints (All Saints' Day)
One celebrates the feast of all the Saints with a great solemnity because it recapitulates all the other feasts which, in the year, are celebrated in the honour of the Saints. This feast is also the figure of the eternal feast of the heaven.
As the Church is "the holy People of God", all its members are called holy (Acts 9, 13; 1 Corinthians 6, 1; 16, 1). That which believes in Jesus Christ, loves his neighbour and lives in the state of grace, is holy.
Among those which left this world, the Church canonizes some of them, a very small number among many. Church then proclaims solemnly that they practiced the virtues heroically and lived in fidelity with the grace of God. That means they enjoy the beatific vision and can be regarded as models to follow. These Christians were however not perfect, because God alone is perfect, nor inevitably martyrs or beings out of the common run, but they sought to live the Gospel in an authentic way.
The saints hold a great place in the liturgy of the Church.
Each time we celebrate Eucharist, we evoke their invisible presence. They are the Church of the Heaven.
Pentecost
Pentecost was also a very solemn festival for Hebrews. It was instituted in remembering the gift that God had made them, on the Sinai mount, in the middle of the thunders and of the flashes, the Law written on two stone tables, fifty days after first Passover, i.e. after their delivery of the slavery.
In the solemnity of Pentecost, Church celebrates the arrival of the Holy Spirit. The feast of the arrival of the Holy Spirit is called Pentecost, i.e. fiftieth day, because the arrival of the Holy Spirit took place fifty days after the resurrection of Jesus-Christ. :
"When the day of Pentecost had come, they were all together in one place. And suddenly a sound came from heaven like the rush of a mighty wind, and it filled the entire house where they were sitting. And there appeared to them tongues as of fire, distributed and resting on each one of them.
And they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak in other tongues, as the Spirit gave them utterance" (Acts 2, 1-13).
The Holy Spirit, going down on the Apostles, fills them of wisdom, force, charity and the abundance of all his gifts.
The first fruit of the preaching of the Apostles after the descent of the Holy Spirit was the conversion of three thousand people to the preaching made by Peter the very same day of Pentecost.
Celestial Spirits
By the feast of all Angels, Church honours especially archangel Michael because he is the prince of all the Angels. But Church holds also a day to celebrate the guardian angels.
One employs sometimes the word "angels" to indicate the celestial spirits generally. In fact, angels are spiritual creatures forming part, according to the Tradition, of an infinity of celestial Companies whose attempts at classification do nothing but highlight the difficulties of the human language of saying something of it. Yet, yhey are quite present in the Scriptures:
The Seraphim (majestic beings with the six wings) appear in the book of Isaiah (6, 2, and 6); they are the Spirits closest to God. Cherubim, often mentioned in Bible, is in particular placed at the east of the Eden (the Paradise) to prevent the human ones there returning and from reaching the Tree of Life (Genesis 3, 24).
On his side Paul or Peter mention other categories of celestial spirits: Thrones, Dominions, Principalities, Authorities, Powers (Col 1, 16; Ep 1, 21; 1 Peter 3, 22).
With regard to the angels, the Bible gives the name of three of them: Michael, Gabriel and Raphael.
Apart from the exterminating angel in question in the account of first Passover and in the first book of the Chronicles (21, 15).
Jesus is presented in the Temple
Forty days tackle the birth of Jesus; Mary and Joseph carry Jesus Child to the Temple, in order to present him at the Lord according to the Law of Moses (Exodus 13, 11-13).
This day is thus at the same time the feast of the meeting with Simeon, old man who personifies the meeting of the Lord with his people. These episodes are told by Luke:
"And when the time came for their purification according to the law of Moses, they brought him up to Jerusalem to present him to the Lord [...] Now there was a man in Jerusalem, whose name was Simeon, and this man was righteous and devout, looking for the consolation of Israel, and the Holy Spirit was upon him. [...] and when the parents brought in the child Jesus, to do for him according to the custom of the law, he took him up in his arms and blessed God and said, "Lord, now lettest thou thy servant depart in peace, according to thy word; for mine eyes have seen thy salvation which thou hast prepared in the presence of all peoples, a light for revelation to the Gentiles, and for glory to thy people Israel" (Luke 2, 22-38). After that, Jesus lives hidden in Nazareth with his parents; Gospel known as of Jesus: "the child grew and became strong, filled with wisdom; and the favour of God was upon him" (Luke 2, 39-40).
Palms Sunday (entry of Jesus into Jerusalem)
Last Sunday of the Lent is Passion and Palm Sunday, which opens the Holy Week. Christians revive the triumphal entry of Jesus in Jerusalem, as Messiah. After, one listens to the reading of Passion to prepare at the Holy Week where one will follow Jesus in his passion and his death.
Palm Sunday one makes a procession with olive branches, boxwood or palms to recall the crowd which carried palms to the hand to receive Jesus :
"A great crowd who had come to the feast heard that Jesus was coming to Jerusalem.
So they took branches of palm trees and went out to meet him, crying, "Hosanna! Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord, even the King of Israel!"
And Jesus found a young ass and sat upon it; as it is written, "Fear not, daughter of Zion; behold, your king is coming, sitting on an ass's colt!" His disciples did not understand this at first; but when Jesus was glorified, and then they remembered that this had been written of him and had been done to him" (John 12, 12-19).
Mary, in the glory of her Son (Mary Queen)
Many texts regard Mary as Queen with various titles. Anthems or other prayers, sometimes very old, often present her under the title of Queen of the heaven: it is the case of the "Ave Regina Caelorum" (I greet you Queen of the Heaven), of the "Regina Caeli" (Queen of the Heaven), or of the "Salve Regina" (We greet you, Queen) and of course litanies, where Mary is called upon like Queen of the angels, of the prophets, of the apostles, of the martyrs, of the confessors, of the virgins and of all the saints. Last mystery of the Rosary is also a meditation on the crowning of the Virgin in the heaven.
Innumerable are the works of art where Mary is represented already crowned or to be crowned by her Son. The first representation of Mary, as a Queen, appears on the worthy mosaics of the triumphal arch of the "Holy Mary basilica" of Rome, built between 431 and 440, just after the council of Ephesus when Mary was proclaimed Mother of God.
With the absolute sense, only Jesus-Christ, God and man, is King. Mary is Queen although in a limited way and by analogy, because she is the Mother of God and associated at his work. She takes share with royal dignity.
The Transfiguration of Jesus
The event is told by the three synoptic evangelists (Matthew, Mark and Luke). As for baptism of Jesus, Transfiguration is a theophany (a manifestation of the divinity of Jesus). This event occurs when Jesus takes along his disciples Peter, James and John on a "high mountain" (traditionally the Tabor mount): "After six days Jesus took with him Peter and James and John his brother, and led them up a high mountain apart. And he was transfigured before them, and his face shone like the sun, and his garments became white as light. And behold, there appeared to them Moses and Elijah, talking with him. And Peter said to Jesus, "Lord, it is well that we are here; if you wish, I will make three booths here, one for you and one for Moses and one for Elijah." He was still speaking, when lo, a bright cloud overshadowed them, and a voice from the cloud said, "This is my beloved Son, with whom I am well pleased; listen to him." When the disciples heard this, they fell on their faces, and were filled with awe.
But Jesus came and touched them, saying, "Rise, and have no fear." And when they lifted up their eyes, they saw no one but Jesus only (Matthew 17, 1-8). The presence of Moses and Elijah means that the Law and the Prophets testify that Jesus is the Son of God.
The Lent
The forty days of the Lent commemorate the forty years of the walk of the Hebrews towards the Land of promise. With the length of these years, people conducted by Moses were often hungry and thirsty. They were sometimes discouraged, but they made the single experiment of the mercy of God towards him. Today, the Lent is a time of fast and penitence instituted by the apostolic tradition. Lent is also instituted to imitate, to a certain sense, the forty days of fast of Jesus in the desert:
"And Jesus, full of the Holy Spirit, returned from the Jordan, and was led by the Spirit for forty days in the wilderness, tempted by the devil. And he ate nothing in those days; and when they were ended, he was hungry. The devil said to him, "If you are the Son of God, command this stone to become bread." And Jesus answered him, "It is written, `Man shall not live by bread alone [...] "It is said, `You shall not tempt the Lord your God.'" (Luke 4, 1-12).
Church imposes ashes at the beginning of the Lent (the Ash Wednesday). The goal is to recall to each one: "You are dust and you will turn over in dust". It is also an invitation to be converted and believe into the Gospel of the salvation.
During these days of penitence, the whole community accompanies catechumens in their preparation with the Baptism.
The Assumption of Mary (or Dormition)
The day of the Assumption is not ignored today, because it corresponds to a public holiday in much country.
According to the deductions which were made, Mary would have been exalted to heaven towards 46. Contrary to the death of Jesus, this event is not considered by the Church as a painful mystery, but as a glorious mystery, placed in the continuation even of the rise of Jesus in the heaven to be glorified there. The dogma of the Assumption is the solemn confirmation of a devotion pre-existent which is discussed neither in the East nor in Occident. Insofar as the Council of Ephesus of 431 proclaims Mary Mother of God, the glorification of his body is a corollary of her divine maternity.
As of the sixth century, indeed, Christians celebrate the feast day of Dormition of Mary which replaces a former feast: the memory of Mary.
It is thus on November 1, 1950, that, after consultation of all the catholic bishops, Church defines as a dogma revealed by God the rise of Mary in body and soul in the glory of the heaven.
Christmas
Christmas Day is the feast instituted to celebrate the memory of the temporal birth of Jesus-Christ.
By the circumstances of his birth, Jesus-Christ teaches us to give up vanities of the world and to appreciate the poverty and the sufferings.
When Jesus-Christ was circumcised, one gave him the name of Jesus, as the Angel had ordered it on behalf of God with Joseph.
The name of Jesus means "the Eternal is salvation". Jesus indeed comes to save us and deliver us our sins.
It is through the account of the nativity according to Luke that we penetrate most readily inside the mystery of Christmas.
The son of Mary is the Son of God made man; the Word makes flesh, like known as the Prologue of John. The child who his mother presents at the shepherds, then to the wise men from the East, is "God born of God, true God born of true God". If Christians celebrate his nativity at the time of the year when, in our hemisphere, the day starts to gain over the night, it is that Jesus was announced as the "raising Sun which comes to visit us". Besides, he says: "Me I am the light of the world".
The Ascension-day
At the fortieth day of Pascal Time, or Sunday following in certain countries, the Ascension of Jesus is celebrated.
This event is told by Luke:
"And when he had said this, as they were looking on, he was lifted up, and a cloud took him out of their sight. And while they were gazing into heaven as he went, behold, two men stood by them in white robes, and said, "Men of Galilee, why do you stand looking into heaven? This Jesus, who was taken up from you into heaven, will come in the same way as you saw him go into heaven" (Acts 1, 9-11).
This feast means that Jesus-Christ rises to the heaven to take possession of the eternal Kingdom conquered by his death, but also to prepare us a place and to be our mediator near the Father.
The day of the Ascension, Jesus-Christ did not enter alone to the heaven; he took with him all the righteous who awaited his coming in the stay of deaths.
Jesus-Christ "sat at the right hand of the Father"; i.e., like God, he is equal to his Father in glory and, like man, he is high above all the Angels and all the Saints and Lord of all things.
Easter
Easter is the feast of the Resurrection of Jesus-Christ. The name of Easter comes from one of the most solemn festivals of the old Law, instituted in remembering the passage of the Angel who put at dead all the first-born Egyptians and in remembering the miraculous delivery of the Jews of the Egyptian Pharaoh. The Hebrews celebrate this festival while sacrificing and by eating a lamb; Jesus is the true Lamb offered in perfect sacrifice for all the sins.
One says or sings often the word "Hallelujah". It means: Praise our God. In fact, joy is reflected throughout all Sundays of the year which always refer at Easter. Christian Passover constitutes the birth of the new people of God. Paul testifies owing to the fact that, as of year 57, the faithful ones of Christ gave a Christian interpretation to the celebration of Jewish Passover: "Christ, our paschal lamb, has been sacrificed." (1 Corinthians 5, 7-8). The annual celebration of death and resurrection of Christ culminates in the Paschal Night, which is the holy night of Christians. This night, Christians listen the word of God who points out to them all the history of the salvation, from the creation and the exodus until the resurrection of Jesus and his exaltation with the heaven. During the paschal Night, catechumens (those which want to become Christians) are baptized.
Easter Saturday
This day, the friends of Jesus collect themselves in the memory of Christ to the tomb. The descent of Christ to "the stay of deaths" is with the node of the mystery of his Passover. It prolongs the humiliation of the cross, by expressing the realism of the death of Jesus, whose soul knew really the separation of with his body and joined the other souls of righteous.
But the descent of Christ to the stay of deaths expresses also the size of his victory: it is bottom of the bottomless pit which he went up with the life. At the same time, he inaugurates already this victory: Christ is descended towards those which awaited him to announce their very close liberation to them. The descent into "the stay of deaths" is the starting point of the great movement which will carry him beyond resurrection in the glory of his rise: "He who descended is he who also ascended far above all the heavens, that he might fill all things.) (Ephesians 4, 10).
From Maundy Thursday at the Easter Saturday, one does not sound the bells as a sign of great affliction for the passion and the death of the Saviour.
The Exaltation of the Cross (The glorious Cross)
One owes the worship only with God alone; also when the Cross is adored, our worship is addressed to Jesus-Christ who died there.
The veneration of the Holy Cross is attached to solemnities of the dedication of the basilica of the Resurrection, set up on the tomb of Christ (in 335).
Christ offered on the Cross his sacrifice for the expiation of the sins of many; the Cross is for the Christian people the sign of the hope of the Kingdom, that the Jewish people celebrate at the time of the festival of the Tents.
If the tree planted with the original paradise produced for Adam a fruit of death, the tree of the cross bore for us a fruit of life, the Christ, "in whom we have salvation and resurrection".
Good Friday
Good Friday is, for Christians of the whole world, one day when one makes report of the Passion of the Lord. Friday of midday to three hours, Christians follow, sometimes in the street, the Way of Cross of Jesus and in the evening, one reads the account of Passion according to John. This day, one also prays with an exceptional solemnity, for all the men without exception, because the salvation was operated by the blood of the Redeemer for many.
The Holy Cross is proposed with the veneration of all.
More than humiliations of Passion, it is the glory of the Cross which bursts in this celebration, because Church does not commemorate the death of the Lord without making memory, at the same time, of his resurrection.
Maundy Thursday
It is for the faithful one and all the people of God a important event to follow each year, during the days of Passover, the events of the passion of Jesus brought back by Gospels. All his actions, and before all the facts of his passion, his death and his resurrection, are carrying salvation, all his words are words of salvation. Church always took a care particular to celebrate the three days during which Christ suffered, died, went down to the Hells, then raised.
What one calls "Paschal Triduum" (three days) starts with the mass of the evening of the Maundy Thursday and is achieved the evening of Easter, after having reached its most intense hours during the paschal Vigil which summarizes all the celebration of Passover.
The Maundy Thursday one celebrates especially the institution of the Eucharist by Jesus:
"As they were eating, he took bread, and blessed, and broke it, and gave it to them, and said, "Take; this is my body." And he took a cup, and when he had given thanks he gave it to them, and they all drank of it. And he said to them, "This is my blood of the covenant, which is poured out for many. Truly, I say to you, I shall not drink again of the fruit of the vine until that day when I drink it new in the kingdom of God" (Mark 14, 22-25).
The Holy Trinity
Church honours the Holy Trinity every day and mainly Sundays; but it devotes a particular feast to her the first Sunday after Pentecost.
Holy Trinity wants to say one God in three really distinct Persons: Father, Son and Holy Spirit. God is a pure spirit; one however represents the three divine Persons by certain images, to make known to us some properties or actions that one allots to them, and the way in which sometimes they appeared.
God the Father is sometimes represented in the shape of an old man ("As I looked, thrones were placed and one that was 'Ancient of days' took his seat") (Daniel 7, 9) to mean divine eternity thus, and because he is the first Person of the very Holy Trinity and the principle of the two other Persons (his only Son and the Holy Spirit). The Son of God is represented in the shape of a man, because he is really man, having taken the human nature for our salvation. The Holy Spirit is represented in the shape of a dove, because it is in this form that he went down on Jesus-Christ at the time of her Baptism by saint John Baptist.
Baptism of Jesus
The Baptism of Jesus opens his public life. Jesus de Nazareth is descended in the Jordan with the sinners, but when he goes up river, God the Father reveals that he is his beloved Son, and the Holy Spirit expresses, while resting on him, that he is the anointed of the Lord, the Christ.
John Baptist can testify: "He is him the Son of God". But John can also say that he is "that which removes the sin of the world". Indeed, the baptism of Jesus is not only the demonstration of his divinity, it "reveals us the new baptism". Jesus is descended in water to sanctify it. From now on those which will be born again "of water and Spirit" by the baptism and the Confirmation will become adoptive sons of God.
With the baptism of Jesus, the heaven opened; the Spirit, like a dove, rested on him, the voice of the Father was made hear: ""This is my beloved Son, with whom I am well pleased" " (Matthew 3, 17).
Epiphany (or Theophany)
Epiphany wants to say "manifestation".
This feast celebrates the birthday of the baptism of Christ but also the revelation that Jesus-Christ is the Messiah.
Therefore, the Wise men come from the East adore Jesus. They bring gold, frankincense and myrrh. Gold is the present of the kings; the frankincense is used for the worship and the myrrh, to prepare the body before the setting with the tomb.
The feast celebrates moreover the wedding at Cana when Jesus achieves his first miracle. Epiphany, observed since 194, is older than Christmas and was always a feast of the highest importance.
With the arrival of the wise men from the East in Bethlehem the mystery starts to be revealed: people of the entire universe are moving towards Christ.
Advent
The four weeks which precede Christmas are called Advent, which wants to say "coming", because, during this time, Church is prepared to celebrate the memory of the first coming from Jesus-Christ in this world by his birth.
The first part of the Advent celebrates more the second coming of Christ, when he will return in glory at the end of times. The second part of the Advent (last eight days) is more directly centred on the preparation with Christmas.
All the liturgy of the Advent is the occasion to meditate on the arrival of the Lord who took the condition of the men and the advertisement of his second coming, in the glory.
Mary visits Elizabeth
The visit of Mary to his cousin is told by Luke. Mary and Elizabeth are both pregnant. Elizabeth will give birth to John Baptist, and Mary will give rise to Jesus, the Messiah, and the Saviour.
"In those days Mary arose and went with haste into the hill country, to a city of Judah, and she entered the house of Zechariah and greeted Elizabeth. And when Elizabeth heard the greeting of Mary, the babe leaped in her womb; and Elizabeth was filled with the Holy Spirit and she exclaimed with a loud cry, "Blessed are you among women, and blessed is the fruit of your womb! And why is this granted me, that the mother of my Lord should come to me? For behold, when the voice of your greeting came to my ears, the babe in my womb leaped for joy. And blessed is she who believed that there would be a fulfilment of what was spoken to her from the Lord." (Luke 1, 39-45). A sudden joy filled Mary and Elizabeth because of the Mystery which prepares.
Then Mary sings the "Magnificat", "And Mary said, "My soul magnifies the Lord, and my spirit rejoices in God my Saviour, for he has regarded the low estate of his handmaiden. For behold, henceforth all generations will call me blessed; for he who is mighty has done great things for me, and holy is his name. And his mercy is on those who fear him from generation to generation.... " (Luke 1, 46-56).
Mary, Mother of God
It is with the Council of Ephesus (town of current Turkey), in 431, that Mary is proclaimed Mother of God (Theotokos in Greek: who carries God).
Jesus-Christ, true God and true man, has two natures (human nature and divine nature) joined together in only one Person and Mary is well the Mother of this Person. She is Mother of God.
Beyond the theological definitions, it is with reason that the innumerable people who address to Mary constantly and in all places, by the prayer of the Ave Maria, call upon her as Mother of God: "Holy Mary, Mother of God, pray for us, poor sinners, now and in the hour of our death".
It is the same for the liturgical prayer. In the oriental liturgy for example, the assembly sings: "It is really right you to proclaim happy, O Theotokos, happy always, very immaculate and Mother of our God. You which are worthier than Cherubim and incomparably more glorious than the Seraphim, you which without sin generated God the Word, you which are really Mother of God, we magnify you".
Nativity of Mary
Church celebrates the feast of the birth of Mary the eighth day of September, because she is holiest of all the creatures and because she is the Mother of the Saviour. Since the beginning of the 6th century, one venerates in Jerusalem, close to the swimming pool of Bézatha, the place where would have been born the Virgin Mary. It is in the basilica of the Nativity of Mary, become at the 12th century the church Saint-Anna, that Saint John of Damascus celebrated the mystery of this day: "Today for the world the beginning of the salvation is." Acclaim the Lord, all the earth, sing, play of the instruments! "Raise your voice," make hear it without fear! ", bus in holy Sheep Gate a Mother of God was born to us, of who agreed to be born the Lamb from God, who removes the sin of the world" (Homily on the nativity, 6). The liturgy echoes these words. If "the beginning of the salvation" is due to the maternity of Mary, one can say that the birth of Mary makes "raise on the world the hope and the dawn of the salvation". As of her coming on earth, Mary occupies a privileged place in the intention of God: she is "the Virgin who will give birth to a son", that by whom must come "the Sun of justice, Christ our God".
The Immaculate Conception
The feast of the Immaculate Conception recalls that, as of the first moment of her creation, the soul of Mary is not reached by the original sin. This dogma is sometimes confused with that of the virginity of Mary, according to whom Jesus was borne by a virgin mother.
The proclamation of the dogma carried out in 1854, is framed by two apparitions where Mary professes herself his immaculate conception. Fourteen years front, in 1830, in full heart of commercial Paris, Mary asked Catherine Labouré that one makes strike a medal with an invocation where she names herself "conceived without sin" and on March 25, 1858, that is to say four years after the proclamation of the dogma, the Virgin answers Bernadette Soubirous, who asks her for her name on behalf of the priest of Lourdes: "Era Immaculada Councepciou" (I am the Immaculate Conception). She came to confirm the dogma of the Immaculate Conception defined by the Church in 1854.
Mary is the only creature to be profited by anticipation from the salvation achieved by his son. To be the Mother of the Saviour, she profited from gifts without equivalents, justifying that the Gabriel angel, at the time of the Annunciation, greets her like "full of grace".
