The Feast of the Immaculate Conception of the Blessed Virgin Mary

We arrive in our Advent journey at the beautiful celebration of the Immaculate Conception of Mary this Tuesday, December 8th. To all my dear Catholic friends this is a holy day of obligation. I've always disliked that term. Obligation implies we have to go and seems to diminish the more interior position of we should want to go. So at churches throughout Catholicism, masses in honor of this great feast will begin tomorrow night, the vigil, and during the day and evening Tuesday.

What is this feast all about? Well, many people have believed it's about the story of how Mary conceived Jesus in her womb by the power of the Holy Spirit. This is not unusual since the Church does read the Gospel from St. Luke 1:26-38, the annunciation story. But make no mistake; this feast is about Mary, being conceived without sin, in the womb of her mother, St. Ann. And this declaration by the Church drives non-believers nuts! But let's take a look at how this could be.

On December 8, 1854, Pope Pius IX declared that the Blessed Virgin Mary, in the first instance of her conception, by a singular privilege and grace granted by God, in view of the merits of Jesus Christ, the savior of the human race, was preserved exempt from all stain of original sin. (Ineffabilis Deus). Now this was far from a singular point in history. From as early as the 7th century, the Church celebrated in some form the conception of Mary. The doctrine that would hold her exempt from original sin even predates that, as recorded by many fathers of the Church.

It should be noted that the formal active essence of original sin was not removed from her soul, it was excluded; it never was in her soul. The immunity from original sin was given to Mary by a singular exemption from a universal law, through the same merits of Christ, by which others are cleansed from original sin by Baptism. Mary, like all of us, needs the redeeming Savior to obtain this exemption from original sin.

I would like to direct you to the following website for a more complete explanation: www.newadvent.org/cathen/07674d.htm. And read through the following Scriptures: Genesis 3:15, Luke 1:28, Proverbs 8, Ecclesiasticus 24 and Song of Songs. Also, read some of the church fathers.

So as you prepare for Mass tomorrow night or Tuesday, thank God for the gift of Mary, conceived exempt for original sin, so she could be handpicked by God to be the spotless perfect ark of the New Covenant, her son Jesus Christ. And fear not, every celebration in the Church of the Blessed Virgin Mary, like Mary herself, points to the one Savior, the one mediator between God and man, Jesus Christ our Lord.