Catholics have a lot of feast days and celebrations. Seriously—Anyone who says Catholics don’t like to party have obviously never looked at our liturgical calendar… The Church celebrates a certain saint or feast literally every day of the year. Some of these feast days are especially important and marked as “Holy Days of Obligation,” meaning it is recognized as equivalent to the Sunday Sabbath and Catholics are obligated to attend Mass. The Holy Days of obligation in the Catholic Church are as follows:
- January 1, the Solemnity of Mary, Mother of God
- Thursday of the Sixth Week of Easter, the Solemnity of the Ascension
- August 15, the Solemnity of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary
- November 1, the Solemnity of All Saints
- December 8, the Solemnity of the Immaculate Conception
- December 25, the Solemnity of the Nativity of Our Lord Jesus Christ
I’d like to bring particular attention to the Solemnity of the Immaculate Conception, which we celebrate today, because there is often a lot of confusion surrounding this feast day among Catholics and non-Catholics alike. On this day, we celebrate the Immaculate Conception of Mary, not Jesus, as many people assume. Since the Church has made this feast a Holy Day of Obligation, it must be pretty significant. So why is that?
What’s the Big Deal About the Immaculate Conception?
Belief in Mary’s Immaculate Conception was developed and nurtured in devotion and prayer for centuries, and was officially recognized by the Catholic Church when Pope Piux IX declared it “infallible doctrine” in 1854. Pius IX solemnly proclaimed in his encyclical Ineffabilis Deus: “The most Blessed Virgin Mary, in the first instant of her conception, by a singular grace and privilege granted by almighty God, in view of the merits of Jesus Christ, the savior of the human race, was preserved free from all stain of original sin.”
Logically, this dogma of the Catholic Church makes sense because in order for Mary to give her free “yes” or “fiat” to become the Mother of God, she needed to be free from every stain of original sin. No human being could have taken on that responsibility without extraordinary grace. The angel Gabriel calls Mary “full of grace” at the Annunciation because it was necessary that she be born completely by God’s grace in order to accept freely the vocation as Mother of God.
Because of the singular grace that God gave Mary at the moment of her conception, He prepared her to be a “fit habitation” (or suitable dwelling) for Christ. Think about it. How could one with sin hold the Holy of Holies in her womb? By making Mary immaculate and sinless, God was preparing the space through which His Son would enter the world.
The New Eve
When God created the first human beings, Adam and Eve, he created them perfect—free from any sin. But they turned away from God and chose a life of sin and, as a consequence, the rest of humanity was born into a fallen state. Jesus is often referred to as the “New Adam” because He, too, was created without sin. Unlike Adam, however, Jesus remained obedient to God and thus redeemed the world. So if there is a “New Adam,” who is the “New Eve?”
Mary!
Mary was born without original sin—perfect—just like Eve. But unlike Eve, she remained obedient to God (like her Son), cooperating with grace to be the mother of the Savior, and thus the Mother of all the redeemed.
Popular Objections
So does that mean that Mary didn’t need Jesus since she never sinned? Wouldn’t Mary’s perfect nature make her equal to God? These are two natural and popular questions that arise in objection to the dogma of the Immaculate Conception.
Firstly, even though Mary never sinned, she still needed a Savior, as we all do. As a descendant of Adam, she was subject to contracting original sin just like the rest of us. However, God intervened before she contracted sin, giving her a singular grace, and she was conceived in her mother’s womb preserved from the stain of original sin and its consequences. “She was therefore redeemed by the grace of Christ, but in a special way—by anticipation (Catholic Answers).” So you could say that God saved Mary first before the rest of humanity at the Immaculate Conception. In anticipation of Christ’s redemptive act on the Cross, where He freed us all from original sin, he first saved His Mother, so that she would be best prepared to bring God into the world.
Secondly, the argument that Mary’s perfect nature makes her equal to God is also incorrect logic because it is not sin that makes one human. Most of the angels never sinned and the souls of the saints in heaven are also free from sin, but that doesn’t make them equal to God! Mary was fully human and desperately needed a Savior like us all. Yet God chose her to bring Him into the world, so He saved her first and gave her the graces necessary to bear His Son.
So Why is Any of this Relevant?
You might be thinking, “That’s cool and all, but what does this doctrine of the Church have to do with me?” Well… everything!!
Mary is the perfect human being and the first saint. She wasn’t God like her Son. She was one of us, which means she was a human who lived a perfect life in communion with God’s plan for her. If we are truly Christians striving for heaven, shouldn’t we be drawn to the life of Mary? Shouldn’t we want to learn from her surrender to God’s plan and live our lives like she did?
The Catholic Church encourages a devotion to Momma Mary and celebrates her on feast days like today because she wants to lead us to her Son—and she knows how to get to Him. As St. Maximilian Kolbe said, “Never be afraid of loving Mary too much. You can never love her more than Jesus did.”
In celebration of this great celebration in the Catholic Church, why don’t we take the chance to get to know our heavenly mom a little better? We all need some motherly advice sometimes, and she’s always there to give it to us.
Read scripture. Pray the rosary. Read about Mary’s earthly apparitions. Or if you’re really feeling up to it, look into doing Marian Consecration. Whatever you choose, give her a chance to lead you closer to her Son. You won’t regret it. 😉
From the depths of my soul,
