Today is the great feast day of The Immaculate Conception of the Virgin Mary. I would have to say however that Mary may not be thrilled with us honoring her this way. She said to Elizabeth, “My soul proclaims the greatness of the Lord, my spirit rejoices in God my Savior.” She never directs attention to herself, but always points others to God and later to her son, Jesus. Shouldn’t it be that way for us as well ? Our actions should never be done to gain attention to ourselves, but rather to lead others to encounter Jesus Christ.
I know Jesus is calling all of us to act more like his mother. This is not an easy task, yet he gives us the grace to help us try to attain this high ideal, to humble ourselves to lead others by example to Jesus. Mary’s life was dedicated to saying “yes” to whatever God asked of her. We need to humble ourselves to be able to say “yes” to every opportunity provided to us by God.
So on this feast of The Immaculate Conception, we celebrate that God in his mercy poured his grace into Mary and continues to pour it out as an ongoing gift to us his children. This is our heritage ! We may not have been conceived without sin as was Mary, but that doesn’t mean God is withholding grace from us. Rejoice in what God has done for us; and thank Mary for being that beautiful model of what it means to live in God’s grace.
DeColores, Deacon Doug
Join us in prayer!
We encourage you to join us as we recite the Holy Rosary every night at 8PM! On Wednesdays, we pray the rosary via Zoom with the rector and rectora.
Resources for those not able to attend Mass
Daily Readings in English and Spanish from the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops:
Prayers, readings for Mass, and additional spiritual readings are available at:
“Give Us This Day” a digital file of their periodical, which includes daily Mass texts. Visit GUTD.net and select “Digital” in the upper right of the screen.
