When a new child is born, there can be some speculation around her or his name. The Hebrews would wait for one week before revealing the name of the new human being. Mary received a name which was common in Hebrew. It was the name of Moses’ sister, Myriam, who unforgettably led the choir of women in singing to God a canticle of praise after the people had crossed the Red Sea in Exodus.
The name of Mary has fascinated the spiritual tradition. St Bernard wrote a sublime homily on the name of the Virgin which was Mary. He invites us to love this name, which he interprets as meaning “the star of the sea”. This name, he says, can gives us direction when we are lost, help when we are in need, and peace when we are troubled. Just as the sailor turns to the star to find his bearings, we can, in all circumstances, turn to Mary and invoke the name of Mary.
Besides her proper name, Mary received from the tradition a great number of titles. These try to express who she is, what was her mission, why she was and remains so important. The great reference here is the so-called Litany of Loreto. The Litany recalls Mary’s unique role in our salvation history as the mother of our Saviour. The Litany owes many of its praises to the Greek Akathist Hymn, which was first translated into Latin in Venice around the year 800. The other titles and praises addressed to Mary are found extensively in the writings of the early Church Fathers of the first six centuries. Most likely the Litany was composed in or around Paris between the years 1150 and 1200 – in the years when a monastery founded in honour of Our Lady on the Isle of Wight was beginning its existence.
After the invocation of her name – Holy Mary, pray for us – the litany uses Mary’s central title of Mother of God. This was proclaimed at the council of Ephesus in 431. It expresses the mystery of this woman called to become the mother of a child who, whilst being fully human was also fully divine, the Son of God, God Himself. By her role in the unfathomable mystery of the Incarnation of the Son of God, Mary is the human creature who is the closest to God himself. One can say that all her other titles express this unique proximity in all its consequences.
The titles are put together in groups. We have first invocations to Mary as Mother; then she is invoked as Virgin; after that she is addressed with a series of poetic titles taken from the Bible; then she is considered in relation to human needs; finally, she is invoked as Queen of the saints. On this her Birthday let me choose three of these titles: Mother of hope; Cause of our joy; and Queen of peace.
The invocation Mother of hope was already used in the Middle Ages. For some obscure reason, it happened to be dropped in modern times, only to be restored by Pope Francis in 2020. Hope relates to life, especially to the gift of a new life. The new-born child Mary is the fruit of her parents’ hope. They receive her from God’s love and mercy, and they trust that she will be blessed by God and become a blessing for many. Indeed, all generations will call her blessed. In today’s celebration, we are given an invitation to hope. God’s grace will be victorious. He is “able to do far more abundantly than all that we ask or think”. To Him be glory in Mary (cf. Eph 3:18-19)!
Mary is also the Cause of our joy. Of course, we all know the immense joy that can come upon us when we have in our arms a new-born child. Each time we turn to Mary, our joy is renewed. Mary is eternally young and youth itself; she has the freshness of grace without any alteration coming from sin. She is life in its fulness coming directly from the hands of the Creator and Redeemer. Again, what a victory in this life: victory over sin, for Mary is Immaculate Conception; victory over death, for Mary’s Assumption has established her fully where she belongs: in the very Heart of God. In any sadness, we turn to Mary and our joy is renewed, our face is illumined for we touch through her the very source of grace and mercy.
Finally, we pray most especially to Mary Queen of Peace. The prayer at the beginning of our Mass asked for a deeper peace: in each of our hearts, in our families and communities, and in the world. Mary’s birth brings peace for the Holy Virgin is perfectly harmonious in herself. She is ignorant of the inner conflicts which we know only too well. She is foreign to any form of worry or aggression. And as our good Mother, she opens to us her children the treasures of her perfectly peaceful Heart. Only a soul possessed by the peace of God could stand at the foot of the Cross of Jesus. With her Son, she gave birth to the Church. By her Son’s gift, she was given to us as our mother, and we were given to her. Everything in her is, in a sense, ours. Her birth is the source of our hope, of our joy and of our peace. May our monastery placed under the patronage of Mary’s Nativity be for many a wellspring of hope, of joy and of peace.