Mary, our Mother, Renewer of Faith

What I once feared most has become an inexpressible source of mysterious joy. This single dark shadow of terror was the final obstacle to my conversion. I could justify prayer to the saints, I was supportive of the sacrament of confession, I was vehement in my belief of transubstantiation. But I could not get past Mary.

Mary, the mother of our Lord, stood in front of me like a pagan goddess. With glowing red eyes and snakes for hair, she beckoned me to abandon God and worship her instead. This, at least, was my impression of the Catholic [mis]understanding of Mary's true role which, as a Protestant, I knew to be nothing more than minor.

How very wrong I was.

Nothing except the Eucharist has done more to bring me to Jesus than the Virgin Mary. When I pray to Mary, I don't suddenly begin to think of her as the creator of the universe or as the saviour of mankind. What I have instead found is that, just as she herself proclaimed, Mary magnifies the Lord. The Virgin Mary is like a magnifying glass to look upon her son, our Lord.

I pray to her as my Mother. If I can in all humility claim to be a brother to the Lord Jesus through adoption, then Christ's mother is mine as well. And she continually guides me not to herself, but to her only son Jesus.

When I doubt, when I fear, when I am anxious, the Blessed Virgin Mary, Mother of God and Queen of Heaven carries me back to the arms of her holy Son.

Hail, Holy Queen, Mother of Mercy,
our Life, our Sweetness, and our Hope.
To Thee do we cry, poor banished children of Eve.
To Thee do we send up our sighs, mourning
and weeping in this valley of tears.
Turn then, most gracious Advocate,
Thine Eyes of Mercy toward us,
and after this our exile show us the
Blessed Fruit of thy Womb, Jesus.
O clement, O loving, O sweet Virgin Mary.