Happy Mother's Day!

"When Jesus saw his mother, and the disciple whom he loved standing near, he said to his mother, "Woman, behold, your son!" Then he said to the disciple, "Behold, your mother!" And from that hour the disciple took her to his own home." ~ John 19:26-27

In this passage from John's Gospel, Jesus Christ dying on the Cross tells "the disciple" to behold his Mother, the Blessed Virgin Mary. Jesus is referring to John, but his actual words are "the disciple," representing all the disciples of Jesus. And so, in that moment, Mary becomes Mother of all disciples of Jesus, including those in our own time who follow Jesus.

To quote Pope John Paul II in his 1987 encyclical Redemptoris Mater, "This is true not only of John, who at that hour stood at the foot of the Cross together with the Mother (of Jesus), but it is also true of every disciple of Christ, of every Christian (45.3)."

The Englishwoman Caryll Houselander (1901-1954), in The Reed of God, has captured the beauty of Mary in a simple yet profound way: "The one thing she did is the one thing that we all have to do, namely, to bear Christ into the world."

In St. Luke's gospel (Luke 1:28), the apostle emphasizes Mary's pure and immaculate state with his use of the unique Greek word κεχαριτωμένη, a word used only once in the entire New Testament of the Bible, a word describing Mary as full of grace.

Hail Mary, full of grace, the LORD is with thee, blessed are you among all women and blessed is the fruit of your womb, Jesus. Holy Mary, mother of God, pray for us sinners now and in the hour of our death. Amen!