Holiness and Marian Devotion

“Full of grace” (Lk 1:28): the holiness of Mary as panagia in the biblical and patristic tradition

Mary was called by the Angel “full of grace” (Lk 1:28). The one full of grace is the mother of Jesus, the Holy Son of God. As the Immaculate One and Mother of the incarnate Son of God, Mary is the all-holy, the Panagia. From the pages of the Bible, through the writings of the Fathers of the Church, to the majestic and splendid medieval cathedrals and the paintings of the world’s most celebrated artists, as well as in the pages of the most distinguished theologians and spiritual masters, Mary is celebrated as the woman whom the Holy Trinity raised to the highest summits of evangelical perfection, because of her humility and modesty.

Mary is an entirely holy creature, being the beloved daughter of the heavenly Father, mother of the Son, and tabernacle of the Holy Spirit. For this reason, the Christian faithful look to Holy Mary as the Queen of all Saints. Saints such as Saint John Bosco found in her inspiration and help for a heroic witness to the Christian virtues of faith, hope, and charity. The saints placed themselves, as diligent disciples, in the school of Mary, in order to become exemplary brothers and sisters of Jesus and credible witnesses of the Gospel beatitudes.

Marian devotion is part of the treasure of Catholic piety. In every Catholic church or oratory, beside the tabernacle, there is always, unfailingly, an image of Mary, the mother who leads her children to communion with Jesus and to adoring Him in the tabernacle. In the constitutions, in the rules of religious families, and in the various forms of consecrated life today, the essential reference to devotion to Mary, the one consecrated in the most perfect way and the model of all consecrated life, is never lacking.

When the storm of persecution blows, invocation of and prayer to the Virgin become anchors of perseverance in faith and hope. History bears witness that the Christian faith remained alive even under the communist regimes of Eastern Europe, because mothers and grandmothers said their prayers to the Holy Virgin in secret at night, imploring help and liberation from the Mother of the Lord. And Saint John Paul II, a wholly Marian pope, attributed to Mary’s intercession the liberation of entire peoples from the oppression of tyrants. The Marian rosary is the crown that passes daily through the fingers of millions upon millions of the baptized throughout the world.

Mary, Formator of the Saints according to Augustine (†430) and Louis de Montfort (†1716): Faith, Humility, and Obedience as a Marian Itinerary

Through her virtues, Mary becomes the formator of the faithful and of the saints, who, by imitating her, bear witness with greater constancy to the following of Jesus. The saints see in her, above all, the teacher, the educator, who teaches more through concrete attitudes of faith, humility, and obedience than through words.

The saints find in Mary the guide for following the right path. For this reason, especially in Spain, the Blessed Virgin is often called the Good Shepherdess, the one who accompanies the saints in singing the praises of God and in living, with joy and sacrifice, their baptismal or religious consecration.

For consecrated persons, Mary is an experienced guide, for she knows the way to climb the mountain and reach the summit of Tabor and of Calvary, where she meets Christ the Lord. She is the model of holiness. Saint Teresa Benedicta of the Cross saw Mary not only as a model before us, but as someone who is beside us, holding us by the hand and accompanying us, day after day and step by step, to the goal of holiness.

The saints are, without doubt, reflected in Jesus, the supreme model of our Christian life. Jesus is, in fact, the prototype of holiness: “I have given you an example, so that as I have done, you also should do” (Jn 13:15). He is the Holy One of God (Acts 3:14) and the teacher of truth (Mt 22:16). The whole Christian life is an “imitation of Christ.” Consecrated life is grounded in the words and examples of the Lord.

Mary was the most faithful disciple of Christ. For this reason, she becomes the model of holy life for all disciples. Saint Ambrose of Milan said that the life of the Blessed Virgin is, in itself, a teaching for all. Contemporary spirituality continues to highlight the exemplarity of Mary, the mother who shines as a model of virtue before the community of the baptized.

Mary, Spiritual Mother of All the Redeemed: The Testimony of Saint Pio of Pietrelcina (1887-1968)

Why is the Blessed Virgin the teacher, educator, guide, and model of Christian life and of consecrated life? She is so because she is the mother of Jesus and the spiritual mother of all those redeemed in Christ.

Saint Pio of Pietrelcina felt the Blessed Virgin Mary particularly close to his filial heart. Giving voice to the experience and sentiments of many faithful and consecrated persons, Padre Pio writes in one of his letters: “This dear Mother continues to lovingly offer me her maternal care […]. Her care for me is full of tenderness […]. What have I done to deserve such delicacy? Has my conduct not been a continual denial, I do not say of her Son, but even of the very name of Christian? And yet this most tender Mother, in her great mercy, wisdom, and goodness, has willed to punish me in a most exalted way, pouring into my heart such and so many graces that, when I find myself in her presence and in that of Jesus, I am compelled to exclaim: ‘Where am I, where do I find myself, who is beside me?’ I feel completely aflame without fire. I feel united and bound to the Son through this Mother […]. I would like to fly to invite all creatures to love Jesus, to love Mary. Here is a pale description of what happens to me when I am with Jesus and Mary.”

The same Capuchin Saint further describes the concrete help of this heavenly Mother, who relieves him of physical infirmities and spiritual anguish. For the feast of the Assumption, Padre Pio wrote: “We Catholics, who venerate in Most Holy Mary the most tender and affectionate Mother imaginable, cannot fail to exult with joy on this sacred day in memory of her greatest triumph, I mean her Assumption into heaven and her coronation as Queen of the angels and of all the saints. Let us linger, therefore, in contemplating the power and glory of Most Holy Mary assumed into heaven, so as to be inflamed even more in devotion and trust in her.”

The Dogma of the Immaculate Conception (1854) and the Martyrial Holiness of Saint Maximilian Kolbe (1894-1941)

The dogma of the Immaculate Conception highlights the fullness of grace granted to the Blessed Virgin. The saints meditated deeply on this truth of faith, drawing from it inspiration for sanctification and the apostolate. A notable example is Saint Maximilian Kolbe, whose mission and martyrial holiness have as their key his Marian devotion, his filial piety toward the Immaculate. His soul sings the glories of the Blessed Virgin with enthusiasm and profound participation. For him, the Immaculate is “the summit of the love of creation returning to God.” In the Immaculate, the faithful can overcome the barriers of their own limits and attain holiness. The Immaculate is necessary, not only as a model to be followed, but above all as an effective and powerful maternal mediatrix. Only in the Immaculate do the faithful manage to break through their limitations and reach “the summit of perfection.”

Celebrating the dogma of the Immaculate Conception fifty years after its proclamation, Pope Saint Pius X, in the Encyclical Ad diem illum of 1904, affirmed that Mary is the best guide for arriving at the knowledge of Jesus. She is also mother of all the faithful and mediatrix and consoler of all humanity. Marian devotion thus becomes an incentive to fulfill the will of her divine Son. Being Immaculate, Mary is the second model to be imitated, after Jesus Christ. Her theological virtues, in particular, are examples to follow.

Saint Pius X emphasizes: “Although it is fitting that children should imitate all the virtues of their Most Holy Mother, we desire that the faithful practice those which are principal and are, as it were, the sinews and joints of the Christian life: faith, hope, and charity, both toward God and toward neighbor. And although no period of the Virgin’s life was without the splendor of these virtues, they shone in a special way when Mary was present at the birth and at the death of her Son” (Ad diem illum).

Marian Devotion and Christian Holiness according to Vatican II (LG 66-67): Mary as the Archetype of the Human Response to the Divine Mystery

In Mary we find the archetype of the human response to the divine mystery, a creature fully receptive to God’s action and, at the same time, active in the consent that transforms history. Her holiness, marked by the absolute purity of the Immaculate Conception, is not an end in itself, but the summit of the love that redeems, a total self-giving to the divine will that makes her mother of all the redeemed. Mary lives in perfect harmony with Trinitarian Love, and is therefore the human figure who best reveals and reflects the glory of God.

Christian spirituality recognizes that, in contemplating Mary, we look upon humanity itself transfigured by grace. For the saints, she is the “gate of heaven,” the threshold where the human and the divine meet in profound harmony. In her humility, Mary does not point to herself, but to the Mystery that dwells in her, becoming the model of the spiritual exodus through which every disciple is called to pass in order to enter into communion with the Son. Devotion to Mary, far from being a gesture of simple veneration, is an introduction to the mystery of obedience and love, a summons to live the faith in its totality, under the gaze of the Mother who leads us to the mystery of Christ.

Mary, therefore, is the “all-holy” who remains as intercessor and spiritual educator. It is at her side that the faithful are invited to tread the way of the cross that leads to the resurrection. She is the icon of redeemed humanity, the one who, in the presence of the Trinity, fully dwells in the promised beatitude. In following in her footsteps, we contemplate, in her glory and humility, the ultimate destiny to which we are called: the fullness of life in God. This holiness of all the redeemed is celebrated on All Saints’ Day.

Further your studies: explore Mariology, Marian Theology, Marian apparitions and the Postgraduate Program in Mariology.

To deepen the connection between holiness and Marian devotion, consult the Apostolic Exhortation Marialis Cultus of Pope Paul VI.