Who is Mary?
Mary is the Mother of Jesus, Mary is the woman, who, when invited by God to carry his Son in her womb said yes. She gave birth to him in Bethlehem, which we celebrate at Christmas, she brought him up in the Jewish faith in the small town of Nazareth at the end of his life she followed him to Calvary. She watched him die at the hands of the Romans.
After he had risen from the dead she waited in prayer together with those who followed Jesus and she experienced the coming of the Holy Spirit at Pentecost. As she was the mother of the Son of God, she is now the Mother of the Church. She helps to bring us up as true children of God, she waits with us in our sufferings and shares with us the joy of the Holy Spirit.
We have invited her to tell the story of her life in those passages of Sacred Scripture which are about her.
Like all the saints, Mary is alive in the Lord’s love. Because she is the Mother of the Church she plays a special part in our life and we feel drawn to her in friendship and covenant. She prays with us, and we pray with her.
Mary has a special place in our Franciscan way of life through the little Church of the Portiuncula; our Lady of the Angels, one of the churches that Francis rebuilt and its unique place in history.
We are eight hundred years young! - and John Paul II asked the older orders in the Church to adopt the new movements. We adopted the Schönstatt Secular Institute, who like us have the beautiful concept of sharing our home with the Mother of God.
We like singing and have put up the words of a song that is useful for those who pray the prayer of the Rosary, a meditative prayer, with Mary that focuses on the name of Jesus.