Our Omniscient God, even before He created this vast universe, in a very deep mystery, had already willed that He would become Man and as Man He would need a Mother.In the Extraordinary Form of the Mass for the Solemnity of the Immaculate Conception, we find these words from the Epistle: “The Lord possessed me in the beginning of His ways, before He made anything from the beginning. I was set up from eternity, and of old, before the earth was made. The depths were not as yet, and I was already conceived” (Proverbs 8:22-24). The Church applies these words and the remainder of that Epistle to our Lady.
In the Apostolic Constitution issued on December 8, 1854 are these words:
From the very beginning, and before time began, the eternal Father chose and prepared for His only-begotten Son a Mother in whom the Son of God would become Incarnate and from whom, in the blessed fullness of time, He would be born into this world. Above all creatures did God so love her that truly in her was the Father well pleased with singular delight. Therefore, far above all the angels and all the saints so wondrously did God endow her with the abundance of all heavenly gifts poured from the treasury of His divinity that this Mother, ever absolutely free of all stain of sin, all fair and perfect, would possess that fullness of holy innocence and sanctity than which, under God, one cannot even imagine anything greater, and which, outside of God, no mind can succeed in comprehending fully (Ineffabilis Deus – Pope Pius IX).
Saint Francis de Sales writes: “We plant the vine solely for the sake of its fruit; whence the fruit is the primary object in intention, although the leaves and flowers precede it in succession of time. In the same way, our divine Savior stood first in the eternal Mind and in the designs which Providence conceived as the purpose of creation. And it was in contemplating this desirable end that the divine Majesty planted the Vine of the universe, and established the passing of many generations, which like leaves and flowers were to produce the Fruit, as the forerunners and means of preparation which would fitly lead to the production of that Grape, so highly praised by the Virgin Bride, the juice of which rejoices both God and man” (Treatise on the Love of God, Bk. II, Ch. V).
Let us pray for all Christians who sadly see Mary as an obstacle rather than a loving Mother.
“He that shall find me shall find life, and shall have salvation from the Lord” (Proverbs 8:35).
