148. Mary, Our Lady of Good Help

Mary, Our Lady of Good Help

YOUCAT Catechism + Catechism of the Catholic Church Lesson 148

Ave Maria series

148  Can Mary really help us?

Yes.  Since the beginning of the Church, experience has taught us that Mary helps.  Millions of Christians testify to it.  [967-970]

The Crowning of Mary Queen of Heaven by  Diego Velázquez. ....148

Being the Mother of Jesus, Mary is also our Mother.  Good mothers always stand up for their children.  Certainly this Mother does.  While still on earth she interceded with Jesus for others; for example, she protected a bride and groom in Cana from embarrassment.  In the Upper Room on Pentecost she prayed in the midst of the disciples.  Because her love for us never ceases, we can be sure that she will plead for us in the two most important moments of our life: “now and at the hour of our death”.  85

“God did not give mankind a maid, but a Mother”  Blessed Adolf Kolping (1813-1865, apostle to laborers and craftsmen)

When the wine failed, the mother of Jesus said to him, “They have no wine.”  And Jesus said to her, “O woman, what have you to do with me?  My hour has not yet come.”  His mother said to the servants, “Do whatever he tells you.”  John 2:3-5

The Catholic approach to Mary distinguishes veneration from worship and is based on the reference in the Gospel of Luke to Mary as the selected handmaid of the Lord who is greeted and praised  by both Elisabeth  and the angel Gabriel.   God's work is further illuminated in the Marian dogmas of the Roman Catholic Church such as the Immaculate Conception and the Assumption, and are, in the Roman Catholic view, part of the apostolic tradition and divine revelation.

[967-970]

Mary is our Mother in the order of grace

967 By her complete adherence to the Father's will, to his Son's redemptive work, and to every prompting of the Holy Spirit, the Virgin Mary is the Church's model of faith and charity. Thus she is a "preeminent and . . . wholly unique member of the Church"; indeed, she is the "exemplary realization" (typus)(Lumen gentium 53; 63)⁵¹⁰ of the Church. —Catechism of the Catholic Church, Second Edition

968 Her role in relation to the Church and to all humanity goes still further. "In a wholly singular way she cooperated by her obedience, faith, hope, and burning charity in the Savior's work of restoring supernatural life to souls. For this reason she is a mother to us in the order of grace."( Lumen gentium 61)⁵¹¹ –CCC

969 "This motherhood of Mary in the order of grace continues uninterruptedly from the consent which she loyally gave at the Annunciation and which she sustained without wavering beneath the cross, until the eternal fulfillment of all the elect. Taken up to heaven she did not lay aside this saving office but by her manifold intercession continues to bring us the gifts of eternal salvation . . . . Therefore the Blessed Virgin is invoked in the Church under the titles of Advocate, Helper, Benefactress, and Mediatrix."(Lumen gentium 62)⁵¹² –CCC

970 "Mary's function as mother of men in no way obscures or diminishes this unique mediation of Christ, but rather shows its power. But the Blessed Virgin's salutary influence on men . . . flows forth from the superabundance of the merits of Christ, rests on his mediation, depends entirely on it, and draws all its power from it."(Lumen gentium 60)⁵¹³ "No creature could ever be counted along with the Incarnate Word and Redeemer; but just as the priesthood of Christ is shared in various ways both by his ministers and the faithful, and as the one goodness of God is radiated in different ways among his creatures, so also the unique mediation of the Redeemer does not exclude but rather gives rise to a manifold cooperation which is but a sharing in this one source."(Lumen gentium 62)⁵¹⁴ –CCC

Mary Queen of Heaven