The month of December is dedicated to the Immaculate Conception of the Blessed Virgin Mary. “From all eternity God chose with infinite wisdom the woman who would be the Mother of His divine Son. To prepare for the Word Incarnate a spotless and holy tabernacle, God created Mary in grace and endowed her from the moment of her conception with all the perfections suited to her exalted dignity. St. Thomas teaches that through her intimacy with Christ, the principle of grace, she possessed beyond all creatures a fullness of divine life.” — Liturgical Meditations, The Sisters of St. Dominic
This feast invites us to meditate on the virtue of purity. “Mary alone — ‘our tainted nature’s solitary boast’— never saw her soul’s purity darkened with the dust of any stain, nor did she see in any part of her triumphal course toward heaven any sin or trace of worldliness. By a unique and singular privilege from God she was preserved from original sin from the first moment of her Immaculate Conception; by another privilege derived from the first, the Lord did not permit her ever to be stained even with those unavoidable failings of human weakness.” — Luis M. Martinez
Prayer to Mary: O God, who by the Immaculate Conception of the Virgin didst make ready a fitting habitation for Thy Son, we beseech Thee that Thou who didst keep her clean from all stain by the precious death of the same Son, foreseen by Thee, may grant unto us in like manner to be made clean through her intercession and so attain unto Thee. Through the same Christ our Lord. Amen
