She said YES ~ Yes she did! Happy Birthday Mary!!!

Today we celebrate the Nativity of Mary. When hearing the word “Nativity” we think of the birth of Jesus rather than Mary. I remember a time when I was worried about loving Mary. Was I giving her love due only to God? Our gentle Lord let me know there is a reason we cannot measure love. It is because love is infinite. There is more than enough to spread around.

There is this man I used to work with who told me God randomly picked Mary to be the Mother of Jesus. I’m sure he went on and on about it because he knew of my Catholicism. He basically said she was at the right place at the right time. Even then I found it humorous. I could picture God pointing His finger around saying, “maybe that one…no, I think that one.” I wasn’t able to dialogue with him way back when. But as time passed there is one thing I have learned about our Creator. He is ordered, He is a designer, and He would not leave the Mother of His Child to chance. Even humans (responsible ones) don’t randomly pick a person to form a family.

It was funny because as a youngster people told me Catholics, like me, had to pray to Mary to get to God. I didn’t quite understand it because I prayed to God every night. Did these people know something about Catholics I didn’t? Now I know they didn’t know much, if anything, about Catholics. Well as I grew in my faith God began to give me answers about Mary, sometimes from the questions of others. One such question came from another guy at work. He asked me, “Why did God make it so Jesus would come from Mary?” He clarified by asking, “Why did He come from a woman?” I can only guess he was wondering why God didn’t just show up. I thought of all the questions! I’d never heard that one, but I told him I’d try to find out. Shortly after that my dad handed me a book, and there was the answer. In the beginning woman (Eve) came from man (Adam), and through this man came sin. For our redemption God reversed this occurrence and Mary gave birth to Jesus. This time man came from woman, and through this God-Man, Jesus, comes salvation.

So here I began to see Mary’s role. When she said, “yes” to God, her place was fulfilled. She holds a unique position. She is the daughter of the Father, the spouse of the Holy Spirit, and the mother of the Son. She is not Deity, but she is intricately entwined with the Trinity. And from there she calls us to the Glory of God. She is forever pointing not to herself, but to Him! Where Eve participated in the fall of man, Mary participates in the redemption. Satan thought he’d won with the disobedience of Eve. Oh but he underestimated the obedience of Mary. But the serpent would soon learn this when God Himself said, “I will put enmity between you and the woman and between your seed and her seed…”