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Marian Devotion (Day 2)

May 02, 2024

Fr. John Colacino C.PP.S.

Day 2

A reading from the letter to the Ephesians (1:3-6, 11-12)

Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ,
who has blessed us in Christ
with every spiritual blessing in the heavens,
as he chose us in him, before the foundation of the world,
to be holy and without blemish before him.
In love he destined us for adoption to himself through Jesus Christ,
in accord with the favor of his will,
for the praise of the glory of his grace
that he granted us in the beloved.

In him we were also chosen,
destined in accord with the purpose of the One
who accomplishes all things according to the intention of his will,
so that we might exist for the praise of his glory,
we who first hoped in Christ.

From Against Heresies by St. Irenaeus of Lyons

Luke points out that the pedigree which traces the generation of our Lord back to Adam contains seventy-two generations, connecting the end with the beginning, and implying that it is He who has summed up in Himself all nations dispersed from Adam downwards, and all languages and generations of men, together with Adam himself. Hence also was Adam himself termed by Paul “the figure of Him that was to come” (Rom. 5:14), because the Word, the Maker of all things, had formed beforehand for Himself the future dispensation of the human race, connected with the Son of God; God having predestined that the first man should be of an animal nature, with this view, that he might be saved by the spiritual One. For inasmuch as He had a pre-existence as a saving Being, it was necessary that what might be saved should also be called into existence, in order that the Being who saves should not exist in vain.

In accordance with this design, Mary the Virgin is found obedient, saying, “Behold the handmaid of the Lord; be it unto me according to your word” (Lk. 1:38). But Eve was disobedient; for she did not obey when as yet she was a virgin. And even as she, having indeed a husband, Adam, but being nevertheless as yet a virgin (for in Paradise “they were both naked, and were not ashamed” [Gen. 2:25] inasmuch as they, having been created a short time previously, had no understanding of the procreation of children: for it was necessary that they should first come to adult age, and then multiply from that time onward), having become disobedient, was made the cause of death, both to herself and to the entire human race; so also did Mary, having a man betrothed to her, and being nevertheless a virgin, by yielding obedience, become the cause of salvation, both to herself and the whole human race. And on this account does the law term a woman betrothed to a man, the wife of him who had betrothed her, although she was as yet a virgin; thus indicating the back-reference from Mary to Eve, because what is joined together could not otherwise be put asunder than by inversion of the process by which these bonds of union had arisen; so that the former ties be cancelled by the latter, that the latter may set the former again at liberty. And it has, in fact, happened that the first compact looses from the second tie, but that the second tie takes the position of the first which has been cancelled. For this reason did the Lord declare that the first should in truth be last, and the last first (Matt. 19:30, 20:16). And the prophet, too, indicates the same, saying, “instead of fathers, children have been born unto you.” For the Lord, having been born “the First-begotten of the dead” (Rev. 1:5), and receiving into His bosom the ancient fathers, has regenerated them into the life of God, He having been made Himself the beginning of those that live, as Adam became the beginning of those who die (1 Cor. 15:20-22). Wherefore also Luke, commencing the genealogy with the Lord, carried it back to Adam, indicating that it was He who regenerated them into the Gospel of life, and not they Him. And thus also it was that the knot of Eve’s disobedience was loosed by the obedience of Mary. For what the virgin Eve had bound fast through unbelief, this did the virgin Mary set free through faith.

That the Lord then was manifestly coming to His own things, and was sustaining them by means of that creation which is supported by Himself, and was making a recapitulation of that disobedience which had occurred in connection with a tree, through the obedience which was [exhibited by Himself when He hung] upon a tree, the effects also of that deception being done away with, by which that virgin Eve, who was already espoused to a man, was unhappily misled — was happily announced, through means of the truth spoken by the angel to the Virgin Mary, who was also espoused to a man. For just as the former was led astray by the word of an angel, so that she fled from God when she had transgressed His word; so did the latter, by an angelic communication, receive the glad tidings that she should sustain God, being obedient to His word. And if the former did disobey God, yet the latter was persuaded to be obedient to God, in order that the Virgin Mary might become the advocate of the virgin Eve. And thus, as the human race fell into bondage to death by means of a virgin, so is it rescued by a virgin; virginal disobedience having been balanced in the opposite scale by virginal obedience. For in the same way the sin of the first-created man receives amendment by the correction of the First-begotten, and the coming of the serpent is conquered by the harmlessness of the dove, those bonds being unloosed by which we had been fast bound to death.

Musical Selection (St. Hildegard of Bingen)

O virga ac diadema purpure regis, que es in clausura tua sicut lorica:

Tu frondens floruisti in alia vicissitudine quam Adam omne genus humanum produceret.

Ave, ave, de tuo ventre alia vita processit qua Adam filios suos denudaverat.

O flos, tu non germinasti de rore, nec de guttis pluvie, nec aer desuper te volavit, sed divina claritas in nobilissima virga te produxit.

O virga, floriditatem tuam Deus in prima die creature sue previderat.

Et te Verbo suo auream materiam, o laudabilis Virgo, fecit.

O quam magnum est in viribus suis latus viri de quo Deus formam mulieris produxit, quam fecit speculum omnis ornamenti sui et amplexionem omnis creature sue.

Inde concinunt celestia organa et miratur omnis terra, o laudabilis Maria, quia Deus te valde amavit.

O quam valde plangendum et lugendum est quod tristicia in crimine per consilium serpentis in mulierem fluxit.

Nam ipsa mulier quam Deus matrem omnium posuit viscera sua cum vulneribus ignorantie decerpsit et plenum dolorem generi suo protulit.

Sed, o aurora, de ventre tuo novus sol processit, qui omnia crimina Eve abstersit et maiorem benedictionem per te protulit quam Eva hominibus nocuisset.

Unde, o Salvatrix, que novum lumen humano generi protulisti: collige membra Filii tui ad celestem armoniam.

You branch and diadem of royal purple, who in your enclosedness are like a breastplate, you grew leaves and flowered in a different clime from that in which Adam begot the human race.

Hail to you, hail – out of your womb came forth a different life from that in which Adam left his children naked.

Flower, you did not germinate from dew or drops of rain, nor did the breeze hover over you, but divine brightness within the noblest branch brought you forth.

You branch, your flowering had been foreseen by God on the first day of his creation: out of his Word he made the golden substance – oh maiden destined for praise!

How great in its strength is the first man’s side, from which God drew the form of woman forth, making her the mirror of all his loveliness, making her the embrace of all his creation.

Because of this, heavenly instruments make harmony and all the earth marvels, O Mary, destined for praise, because God loved you surpassingly.

Oh, how surpassingly must it be mourned and lamented that in a crime, at the serpent’s persuasion, sadness flowed into a woman.

For that woman whom God ordained to be mother of all lacerated her womb with wounds of ignorance and bore the fullness of pain for her progeny.

But out of your womb, you dawn, a new sun came forth that effaced all Eve’s crimes and, through you, bore a blessing for mankind bigger than Eve’s harm.

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