Dear Parishioners,

This weekend the Feast of the Assumption of Mary coincides with our Sunday celebration and gives us a chance to reflect on the place of Mary in the devotional life of the Church. Someone recently asked me, "Is the Church downplaying devotion to Mary since Vatican II?" It would certainly seem so by comparison to Catholic practice of 30 or 40 years ago. The Rosary is less prominent that it once was; weekly evening devotions to Mary are either sparsely attended or cancelled entirely; once familiar prayers to Mary attached to the end of every Mass have been deleted; Marian hymns no longer hold the dominant place they once had in Catholic repertory. How to explain this apparent decline?

I believe first and foremost comes the official renewal of the eucharistic liturgy in the mid-sixties with its return to the language of the people and the call for active participation. Prior to that our official liturgy was in Latin with many praying the rosary by themselves as Mass went on, and Marian devotions in English, as the major way Catholics could celebrate their faith as a community. The return of the Eucharist as a personal and public experience for all is certainly a good thing even if Marian devotions now take a definite second place.

Secondly, the Vatican Council (1962-1965) made three important decisions in teaching about Mary. (1) it decided that no separate document or teaching on Mary would be appropriate, but rather that the teaching on Mary belongs as an integrated part of how we understand the Church. The Council placed its teaching on Mary inside its decree on the Church (Lumen Gentium Chpt. 7) rather than in a document or department by herself. This connects Mary to Christ and to the Church by noting that she is "one with all human beings in their need for salvation" and at the same time "a prominent and altogether singular member of the Church" who lived her life as a "pilgrimage of faith." (2) the Council refused to use the title of "Mediatrix" of All Graces" which some argued for and went on to explain that when phrases like "Advocate" or "Mediatrix" are used about Mary they must not detract in any way from the sole and total mediation of Jesus. (3) finally, the Council warned against the two extremes of neglecting devotion to Mary and being overcredulous in our piety toward her. Later documents by Pope Paul VI gave guidelines by which our devotion to Mary should be judged: that it not in anyway overshadow our relation to God; that Christ alone be seen as Savior and Mediator; that respect be given to the work of the Holy Spirit in grace; and, that Mary be seen as a companion and member of the Church.

One other piece of official teaching might be at work moderating the once dominant attention to Mary. That is the teaching now repeated in the New Catholic Catechism that as far as "private revelations" go, faithful Catholics are free to believe or disbelieve, to heed their messages or to dismiss them as fanciful. So when it come to apparitions and messages from places like Lourdes, Fatima or more recently Medjugorje - some Catholics ignore them and others integrate them into their prayer life. I know Catholics for whom the apparitions of Medjugorje are an inspiring experience while others, like the local Bishop there, dismiss them as "collective hallucination."

Is this balance or decline? Now more integrated into our understanding of Christ and the Church, Mary remains woman of faith, prominent among the disciples, first of the redeemed in Christ. Unique as mother of Jesus, in solidarity with the rest of us as a receiver of God's grace, she remains symbol and mother of the Church. Recent Popes have highlighted her as a model for feminists (Paul VI: "a free woman, active, courageous and intelligent") and patroness of liberation and the poor (John Paul II) with the Feast of the Assumption witnessing to the goodness of women's nature capable of the fullness of grace and glory. Mary is still very much a part of our faith and devotion and as one commentator noted: "The Virgin Mary has been more of an inspiration to more people than any other woman who ever lived."

I recommend a few recent books to add to your appreciation of Mary: "Mary Through the Centuries" by Jaroslav Pelikan (Yale); "In Search of Mary" by Sally Cunneen (Ballantine); "A Protestant Pastor Looks at Mary" by Charles Dickson (Our Sunday Visitor); "Surprising Mary: Meditations and Prayers on the Mother of Jesus" by Mitch Finley (Resurrection Press)"; The Reed of God" by Caryll Houselander (Christian Classics).

Your Pastor,

Brian T. Joyce