The Virgin of Christmas

IntroductionAmong Christian feasts that do not fall on a Sunday, Christmas is undoubtedly the first and primary, after Easter and Pentecost. Christmas is a deeply loved feast by the Church’s piety and popular devotion, and it is also highly valued by contemporary culture, despite the abuses of consumerism. For Christians, Christmas is a significant moment: it is the celebration of the great mystery of the Word made flesh among us. Therefore, its celebration should be reflective and conscious. A Christmas celebrated without penitential preparation, without a joyful and solemn Eucharist, without attention to the poor and marginalized, without austerity and moderation, without sharing and mutual forgiveness, without supplication to Mary, the Virgin of Hope, is a banal Christmas that leaves no mark on life.

Mary in the Liturgy of Christmas and Popular Piety

On December 25th, the liturgy celebrates the “Natal of Our Lord Jesus Christ according to the flesh”, as mentioned in the ancient Latin martyrology. However, a son’s birth is also a mother’s feast. Thus, the Christmas season constitutes a prolonged memory of Mary’s divine, virgin, and salvific motherhood, whose immaculate virginity brought the Savior into the world (Marialis Cultus 5). Antiphons, responsories, and hymns of Christmas Day and its octave overflow with reverent admiration for Mary’s virgin birth and love for the blessed fruit of her womb: “Today the King of Heaven is born to us from the Virgin, to lead the lost humanity to the kingdom of heaven”.On the eighth day of Christmas, January 1st, the liturgy celebrates the feast of “Mary, the Most Holy Mother of God” with great joy: “Hail, Holy Mother, you gave birth to the King who rules heaven and earth for ever and ever” (Marialis Cultus 5). It comments that this feast, placed at the beginning of the civil year, celebrates Mary’s role in the mystery of salvation, exalting her singular dignity. It is a propitious time to adore the newly born Prince of Peace, recall the angelic announcement of “peace on earth to men,” and implore God, through the mediation of Mary, Queen of Peace, for the supreme gift of peace. This celebration expands the sense of Mary’s motherhood to encompass the whole Church and humanity, over which we pray for the fullness of peace in its deepest biblical meaning.Other feasts of the Christmas seasonOn January 6th, the Epiphany of the Lord celebrates the universal call to salvation and contemplates Mary as the true Seat of Wisdom and Mother of the King. In the narrative of the Magi, Mary presents the Redeemer to the Gentiles, who recognize and worship the Child as the Christ Messiah (cf. Mt 2:11). Furthermore, the feast of the Holy Family of Jesus, Mary, and Joseph (celebrated on a Sunday between Christmas) celebrates the mystery of childhood and the hidden life of the Savior, highlighting Mary in her full role as Mother. During this period of the King of Glory’s kenosis, Mary appears as the guardian of memories of words and events related to Jesus, participating deeply in his life.Finally, the Feast of the Presentation of the Lord (February 2nd), celebrated on the 40th day of Christmas, remembers the salvific mystery operated by Christ with the intimate union of Mary, his Mother. At this event, Mary hands the Child over to Simeon’s arms, proclaiming Jesus as light for the nations and glory for Israel (cf. Lk 2:32), reaffirming the inseparable connection between the Son and the Mother in the work of salvation (Marialis cultus 7).Popular Marian Piety at Christmas TimeDuring Christmas time, “a great part of the rich and complex mystery of the manifestation of the Lord finds wide echo and proper expressions in popular piety” (Directory 108). Let us remember, for example, the Christmas tree, the exchange of vows, gifts, carols, nativity scenes, kissing the Child Jesus, and placing him in the crèche set up in the church or nearby. Some expressions of popular piety have their original inspiration in the events of the Savior’s childhood and, therefore, invite us necessarily to the figure of Mary, his Mother.CrècheThe nativity scene marks the Christmas season. Its essential elements are suggested by the Infancy Gospels. Luke narrates the birth of Jesus in Bethlehem, of the shepherds watching their flock, as young David did on the outskirts of the city. Matthew indicates Bethlehem as the place visited by the magi, who were guided to the Messiah by a star, the geographic symbol of Christmas. The nativity scene, in fact, is the reconstruction of the biblical pages that inspired Saint Francis of Assisi, on Christmas night 1223, to organize in Greccio, a small village in Umbria, the sacred representation of the birth of Jesus, after obtaining permission from Pope Honorius III. Various figures appear in the nativity scene each year: the shepherds, who receive the angel’s announcement; the flock resting peacefully; houses in the city in the distance; the cave and the manger with the main characters: Mary, Jesus, and Joseph; and, slowly marching towards Bethlehem, the magi’s caravan.The progressive construction of the nativity scene can have a powerful pedagogical force. It is likely one of the most effective tools for visualizing biblical scenes, certainly possessing more energy than modern audiovisual media. It would be extremely positive to follow the construction of the nativity scene by referring to the biblical pages. Planning in stages the placement of figures in respective groups of scenes could offer the opportunity, in the days leading up to Christmas, to read, once each group is placed, the corresponding passage from the Gospels: from Luke, for the birth of Jesus and the announcement to the shepherds; from Matthew, for the magi. This reference to the Gospels would also help to give the nativity scene the perspective of Christian faith, preventing it from being confused with a children’s game.Regarding the figure of “Mary of Nazareth” in the “nativity scene,” in the early centuries of Christianity, the Hellenistic iconographic type of the Nativity prevailed, where Mary is depicted seated. Later, the Syriac type developed, with the Mother of God lying down, which survived until the 14th century. The current placement of Mary in the manger, of Franciscan derivation, gives clear emphasis to her fundamental role as Mother. Mary, kneeling with her head slightly inclined forward, holds her hands together in an act of adoration of the divine Son in the manger. She wears a long pink tunic, typical of ancient Palestine, and “is covered with a blue cloak that wraps her from head to feet and bears three stars, one on her head and two on her shoulders, to signify her virginity before, during, and after the birth, and the grace of the Holy Trinity that sanctified her in spirit, soul, and body.”Nataline HymnsIn the 18th century, Naples stood out for its nativity scene constructions: from that made by King Charles of Bourbon for the royal palace, to the classic ones by Somma, Bottiglieri, Cappelli, and especially by Sammartino, up to the simpler but also more authentic ones in the homes of the poor, in cellars, shops, and alleys.In the fervor of sacred craftsmanship, Saint Alphonse, in his “Christmas Novena,” invites the faithful to make their hearts a manger where Christ comes. In harmony with his people, the saint waits, prays, sings, and rejoices at Christmas. With spontaneity and freshness that ensure eternal values in his song, Alphonse contemplates Mary beside the Infant, singing him a lullaby: the cosmos stops, static before this miracle of love: “Fermarono i cieli / la loro armonia / cantando Maria / la nanna a Gesù” [The heavens ceased / their harmony / singing Mary / the lullaby to Jesus]. At least at Christmas, everyone should rejoice and pray. Even the street children. For them, the saint uses a dialect. It is not irreverence or literary carelessness, but a search for a confident communication: “Quanno nascette Ninno a Betlemme era notte e parea miezo juorno” [When the Infant was born in Bethlehem it was night and it seemed like noon]. However, the song “Tu scendi dalle stelle” [You descend from the stars] indissolubly linked Saint Alphonse’s name to the Christmas solemnity. The saint ascends to the immense love of Christ, who became a Child, through the rhythm of effective contrasts. True love does not tolerate distances, and Christ does not limit Himself to contemplating human sufferings, but experiences and shares them in His flesh. He then descends from the stars and comes to a cave, to the cold, to the ice. To the wealth of the Creator of the world, to the eternal feast in the bosom of the Father, He prefers absolute poverty, even the lack of clothes and warmth, even pain and tears. But here, between the third and fourth stanzas, the key to the message: “Tu piangi non per duol, ma per amore… Caro, non pianger più, ch’io t’amo, io t’amo…” [You cry not for pain, but for love… Dear one, do not cry anymore, for I love you, I love you…]. The song then ends, in harmony with Alphonse’s thought, with the appeal and invocation to Mary, the last hope to reorder things: “O Maria, speranza mia, se io poco amo il tuo Gesù, non ti sdegnare. / amalo tu per me se io nol so amare” [O Mary, my hope, if I love little your Jesus, do not be indignant. / love Him for me if I do not know to love Him]. Even today, with Saint Alphonse, it is still possible to find the right rhythms for a genuine Christmas atmosphere. This had already been intuited by the genius of Giuseppe Verdi when, after hearing the saint’s hymn during the Christmas vigil of 1890 at the Doria Palace in Genoa, he exclaimed: “Without this pastoral, Christmas would not be Christmas”.Rediscovering the Ave Maria“The solemnity of January 1st, eminently Marian, offers a particularly suitable setting for a meeting between liturgical piety and the popular: the first celebrates that event in its own ways. The second, if properly educated, will not fail to give life to expressions of praise and congratulations to the Virgin for the birth of Her divine Son, and to deepen the content of so many formulas of prayer, beginning with that so beloved by the faithful: “Holy Mary, Mother of God, pray for us sinners”.” (Directory 115). Indeed, the Ave Maria, which began, so to speak, with the composition of the Gospel of Luke and was completed, from a liturgical-legal perspective, only in 1569 when Pius V introduced it into the Roman Breviary, is the most known and common prayer that the Church addresses to the Mother of God: it is learned from childhood and repeated throughout life. It is a simple and popular prayer that has its origins in the Gospel and yet carries within it a series of expressions that manifest the human spirit in its concrete situation. It is the prayer that places the pray-er in relation to the Mother of Jesus and our mother, to whom he presents his greeting and his requests.A product of divine inspiration and the experience and mission of the Church, the Ave Maria will always resound as the purest praise and most intense supplication of sinful children, yet confident in the intercession of Mary, from whose virgin womb the Savior of the world was born. As a true treasure of faith, love, filial confidence, and secure hope, the Ave Maria is a biblical prayer, as the first part is taken from the Gospel of Luke. It is an ecclesial prayer, as it reflects the experience of the Church and expresses its faith. It is a liturgical prayer, appearing evocatively in various celebrations of the Liturgy of the Hours and the mysteries of the saints. It is a popular prayer, as it forms the core of widely-loved and practiced pious exercises, such as the Angelus Domini and the Rosary. Finally, it is a catechetical prayer, as it is a source of inspiration for the teaching of the Church and itself a subject of catechesis. What is the Ave Maria if not a necklace composed of two or three pearls, all taken from Scripture, and bound together by a precious stone, the name of Jesus?The first part is a praise and places our lips to the greeting that God directed, through the angel, to Mary of Nazareth (Luke 1:28) and the praise that Elizabeth directed to the Mother of the Lord (Luke 1:42-43). It is a rigorous synthesis of the mystery of the Virgin: her sanctity and the transformation wrought in her by grace (“full of grace”), her singular election (“blessed among women”), the favor with which God accompanies her on the mission he entrusts to her (“the Lord is with you”), her maternal role in the messianic and salvific mission (“blessed is the fruit of your womb”).The second part is a supplication and is a fruit of the experience of the Church: its faith in the divine motherhood (“Mother of God”), its trust in the maternal intercession and mercy of the Virgin (“pray for us”), accompanying the Christian, weak and sinful (“sinners”), on the path of life: “now” (the present), as a concrete expression of life and a unique possibility of action. And “at the hour of our death” (a decisive occasion), as a feared and desired moment: dark and luminous, of struggle and rest, of end and beginning.Family Dedication to the Holy Family of Nazareth“The Feast of the Holy Family of Nazareth offers an appropriate celebrative framework for the development of certain rites or moments of prayer proper to the Christian family” (Directory 112). This feast may be an occasion to renew family dedication to the Holy Family of Nazareth, the blessing of children provided for in the Ritual, the renewal of marital commitments or the exchange of wedding vows by the betrothed (cf. Directory 112).Regarding the formula of the “Act of Dedication,” legitimately approved, the Directory indicates the behaviors to be adopted, the criteria to be considered, and the modalities of execution: as indicated in the Manual of Indulgences, “it must be expressed correctly, in a single line, in a sort of liturgical manner: to the Father through Christ in the Holy Spirit, imploring the glorious intercession of Mary, to whom one is totally dedicated, to observe faithfully one’s baptismal commitments and live in a filial attitude toward her. It must be performed outside the celebration of the Eucharist, being a devotion not assimilable to the Liturgy: the dedication to Mary, in fact, substantially distinguishes itself from other forms of liturgical consecration” (Directory 204).Recommended reading: *Marialis Cultus* (Paul VI), Apostolic Exhortation on Marian Devotion.Deepen your studies by exploring Mariology, Marian Theology, Marian Apparitions, and a Postgraduate degree in Mariology at Locus Mariologicus.ConclusionThe Christmas season is marked by a rich interplay between liturgical celebration and popular piety, both aimed at honoring the incarnation of the Word and Mary’s unique role as Mother of God in the history of salvation. Whether through the solemn Christmas liturgy and its associated feasts, or through popular expressions such as the nativity scene, Christmas carols, or the Hail Mary prayer, Mary’s figure is continually exalted as a model of faith, hope, and spiritual motherhood.During this time, we are invited to contemplate Mary in her fundamental role in the work of salvation, rediscovering the depth of her union with Christ. Just as she welcomed the Savior in her womb and presented Him to the world, we are called to welcome Him in our hearts and bear witness to Him in our daily lives. May the Christmas celebrations renew our faith and inspire us to live the Christmas mystery with the simplicity, trust, and love that characterize the Virgin Mary.The *Locus Mariologicus* Institute is the world’s academic reference in Mariology. Discover our resources on Marian Theology, Marian Apparitions, and a Postgraduate degree in Mariology.