I think the best way to understand the meaning
of today’s celebration is to consider the preface of this Mass. At the
beginning of the Eucharistic Prayer, addressing God, the priest says: “You
preserved the most Blessed Virgin Mary from all stain of original sin, so that
in her, endowed with the rich fullness of grace, you might prepare a worthy
Mother for your Son and signify the beginning of the Church, his beautiful Bride
without spot or wrinkle. She, the most pure Virgin,
was to bring forth a Son, the innocent Lamb who would wipe away our offences;
you placed her above all others to be for your people an advocate of grace and
a model of holiness.”
First of all, the preface tells us the content
of the mystery we are celebrating: “You preserved the most Blessed Virgin Mary
from all stain of original sin.” Immaculate Conception means that Our Lady was
exempt from original sin since the first moment of her existence. That is why
she never experienced sin throughout her life.
Then the preface reminds us of another
privilege of Mary, connected with her Immaculate Conception: she was “endowed
with the rich fullness of grace.” We know that, because when the Angel appeared
to her, he hailed her as “full of grace” (gratia plena). Grace is the opposite of sin: since
Mary was sinless, she was full of grace.
Straight after, the preface discloses the
reason why the Blessed Virgin was preserved immune from sin: in order to
prepare in her a worthy Mother for the Son of God. The Immaculate Conception is
part of the mystery of salvation: God wanted his Son to become man; to do this,
there was need of a mother—a “worthy” mother, a sinless mother. In the opening
prayer of this Mass we said the same: “O God … by the Immaculate Conception of
the Blessed Virgin [you] prepared a worthy dwelling for your Son.”
But, according to the preface, this is not the
only reason why Mary was conceived without original sin. There is another one: to
“signify the beginning of the Church, [Christ’s] beautiful Bride without spot
or wrinkle.” There is a close connection between Mary and the Church: she is
the image—nowadays, we like to say, the “icon”—of the Church. Whatever we speak
of her, we can speak of the Church as well; and vice versa. So, we can see in
her Immaculate Conception somehow the beginning of the Church, she too
immaculate like Mary, “without spot or wrinkle.”
Then the preface mentions another privilege of
Mary, her virginity: of her, “most pure Virgin,” the innocent Lamb was going to
be born, who would take away the sins of the world. That is the reason why God
had decided to send his Son into the world: he would become man to offer
himself as victim for the salvation of humankind. Among those redeemed by Jesus
there is even his Mother: as the opening prayer says, she was preserved from
every stain by virtue of the death of Christ. Mary, too, was redeemed by her
Son; indeed, we can consider her as the best fruit of redemption.
Finally, the preface reminds us of the role
played now by the Virgin: “You placed her above all others to be for your
people an advocate of grace and a model of holiness.” She is for us two things:
advocate and model. Which means: we have to look at her as an example for us to
imitate. Maybe, she is an example too high for our weak strength. No problem,
we are not alone; Mary is also our advocate, the one who prays for us, in order
to get for us the grace necessary to follow her example. Let us then draw near
with confidence to her, so that we may receive from God all the graces we need
in our daily life.
Q
