Mary Could Not Humble Herself More Than She Did in the Incarnation of the Word; God, on His Part, Could Not Exalt Her More Than He Did
“Whosoever shall exalt himself shall be humbled, and he that shall humble himself shall be exalted” (Matt. 23:12). These are the words of our Lord, and they cannot fail. And so, when God had resolved to make himself man in order to redeem fallen man, and thus to manifest his infinite goodness to the world, he had to choose his Mother on earth; and he sought among women the holiest and the most humble. Among them all he beheld one, the youthful Virgin Mary, who, as she was the most perfect in every virtue, so was she the most simple and humble as a dove in her own esteem. “There are young maidens without number; one is my dove, my perfect one” (Cant. 6:8). Let this one, then, said God, be my chosen Mother. Let us now see how humble Mary was, and how greatly God exalted her. That Mary could not humble herself more than she did in the incarnation of the Word will be the first point; that God could not exalt her more than he exalted her will be the second.
First Point. Our Lord, speaking in the holy Canticles precisely of the humility of this most humble Virgin, said: “While the King was at his repose, my spikenard sent forth the odor thereof” (Cant. 1:11). St. Antoninus, commenting on these words, says that the spikenard, being a small and lowly plant, was a figure of the humility of Mary, whose fragrance rose to heaven and drew the divine Word, even from the bosom of the eternal Father, into her virginal womb. The spikenard is a little herb, and signifies the Blessed Virgin, who breathed forth the odor of humility—an odor that ascended even to heaven, and there, as it were, awakened him who was at his repose and brought him to rest in her womb. Thus the Lord, drawn by the fragrance of this humble Virgin, chose her for his Mother when he wished to become man to redeem the world.
But for the greater glory and merit of this his Mother, he would not make himself her Son without first obtaining her consent. He would not take flesh from her, says William the Abbot, without her own giving of it. And so, while the humble young Virgin was in her poor dwelling, sighing and praying to God more earnestly than ever that he would send the Redeemer—as was revealed to St. Elizabeth, a Benedictine nun—behold, the Archangel Gabriel came, bearing the great message. He enters and salutes her, saying: “Hail, full of grace, the Lord is with thee; blessed art thou among women” (Luke 1:28). Hail, O Virgin, full of grace, for you were always rich in grace, above all the other saints. The Lord is with you, because you are so humble. You are blessed among women, for all others have incurred the curse of original sin; but you, because you are to be the Mother of the Blessed One, have been and will always be blessed, and free from every stain.
But what does the humble Mary answer to this salutation, so full of praises? She answered nothing, but was troubled in pondering such a greeting: “Who having heard, was troubled at his saying, and thought with herself what manner of salutation this should be” (Luke 1:29). And why was she troubled? Through fear of some illusion, or through modesty at the sight of a man, as some suppose, recalling that the angel appeared to her in human form? No, the text is plain: she was troubled at his saying. As Eusebius of Emesa remarks, non in vultu, sed in sermone ejus—“not by his appearance, but by his speech.” Such a disturbance, then, arose wholly from her humility on hearing those praises, so far beyond her own lowly esteem of herself. Hence, the more she is exalted by the angel, the more she humbles herself and considers her own nothingness. St. Bernardine remarks: had the angel told her that she was the greatest sinner in the world, Mary would not have been so surprised; but in hearing those lofty praises she was greatly disturbed. She was troubled because, being so full of humility, she shrank from every praise, and desired that none but her Creator, the giver of every good, should be praised and blessed. Mary said exactly this to St. Bridget, speaking of the time when she became the Mother of God: “I disliked my own praise, and wished only to hear that of the giver and Creator.”
But I would add this: the Blessed Virgin had already well learned from the holy Scriptures that the time foretold by the prophets for the coming of the Messiah had arrived; that the weeks of Daniel were now completed; that already, according to the prophecy of Jacob, the scepter of Judah had passed into the hands of Herod, a foreign king; and she well knew that a virgin was to be the Mother of the Messiah. Now she hears those praises addressed to herself by the angel, praises that seemed to belong only to the Mother of God. Did it then enter her mind that perhaps she herself might be that chosen Mother of God? No, her profound humility did not permit even the thought. Those praises had no other effect than to fill her with great fear; so that, as St. Peter Chrysologus remarks, as Christ willed to be comforted by an angel, so must the Virgin be encouraged by an angel. And so it was needful that St. Gabriel, seeing Mary so full of fear at that salutation, should encourage her, saying: “Fear not, Mary, for thou hast found grace with God” (Luke 1:30). Do not fear, O Mary, nor be alarmed at the great titles by which I have saluted you; for if you are so little and humble in your own eyes, God, who exalts the humble, has made you worthy to find the grace lost by man. Therefore he has preserved you from the common stain of all the children of Adam; therefore, even from the moment of your conception, he has adorned you with a greater grace than that of all the saints; and therefore, finally, he now exalts you to be his Mother: “Behold, thou shalt conceive and shalt bring forth a son, and thou shalt call his name Jesus” (Luke 1:31).
Now why this delay? The angel, O Lady, awaits your answer; and so, says St. Bernard, do we who are condemned to death. Behold, O our Mother, continues St. Bernard, the price of our salvation is now offered to you—the divine Word made man in you. If you will accept him for a Son, we shall at once be delivered from death. Behold, the price of our salvation is offered to you; the moment you consent, we are set free. Your Lord himself, as he is greatly enamored of your beauty, so much the more desires your consent, on which he has made the salvation of the world depend. Answer quickly, O Lady, adds St. Augustine; delay no longer the salvation of the world, which now hangs upon your consent.
But behold, Mary now answers; she answers the angel and says: “Behold the handmaid of the Lord; be it done to me according to thy word” (Luke 1:38). Oh, what more beautiful, more humble, and more prudent answer could all the wisdom of men and angels together have devised, had they pondered it for a million years! O powerful answer, which gave joy to heaven and poured upon the earth a vast flood of graces and blessings! An answer that had scarcely come forth from the humble heart of Mary before it drew from the bosom of the eternal Father the only-begotten Son, to become man in her most pure womb! Yes; for hardly had she uttered these words—“Behold the handmaid of the Lord; be it done to me according to thy word”—when at once Verbum caro factum est, the Word was made flesh; the Son of God became also the Son of Mary. O powerful Fiat! exclaims St. Thomas of Villanova; O efficacious Fiat! O Fiat to be revered above every Fiat! For by another fiat God created the light, the heavens, and the earth; but by this fiat of Mary, says the saint, God became man like us.
But let us not wander from our point; let us consider the great humility of the Virgin in this answer. She was indeed well enlightened to understand how great was the dignity of the Mother of God. She had already been assured by the angel that she was this happy Mother chosen by the Lord. Yet for all this she is not in the least raised in her own esteem, nor does she pause to enjoy her exaltation. Rather, considering on the one hand her own nothingness, and on the other the infinite majesty of her God, who chose her for his Mother, she knows how unworthy she is of such an honor, but will by no means oppose his will. And so, when her consent was asked, what does she do? What does she say? Wholly annihilated in herself, and all inflamed, on the other hand, with the desire of uniting herself thus more closely to God by entirely abandoning herself to the divine will, she answers: “Behold the handmaid of the Lord”—behold the slave of the Lord, bound to do whatever her Lord commands. As if to say: If the Lord chooses me for his Mother—I who have nothing of my own, and whose every possession is his gift—who can think that he selects me for any merit of mine? Behold the handmaid of the Lord. What merit can a slave have, to be made the Mother of her Lord? Behold the handmaid of the Lord. Let the goodness of God alone be praised, and not the slave; for it is wholly his goodness that has led him to cast his eye on a creature so lowly as I, and to make her so great.
O humility, exclaims Guerric the Abbot, small in its own eyes, yet great in the eyes of God! Insufficient to itself, yet sufficient for him whom the whole world cannot contain! But still more beautiful, on this occasion, is the exclamation of St. Bernard in his fourth sermon on the Assumption of Mary, in which, admiring her humility, he says: O Lady, how have you been able to unite in your heart so humble an esteem of yourself with so much purity, so much innocence, and with such fullness of grace as you possess? And from where, O blessed Virgin, did this humility—this so great humility—take such deep root in you, when you were so honored and exalted by God? Lucifer, seeing himself endowed with great beauty, aspired to exalt his throne above the stars and make himself like to God (Isa. 14:13). Now what would that proud spirit not have said and attempted, had he seen himself adorned with the privileges of Mary? Not so the humble Mary: the more she saw herself exalted, the more she humbled herself. Ah, Lady, for this beautiful humility, St. Bernard concludes, you indeed merited to be regarded by God with a singular love—to charm your King with your beauty, and to draw him, by the sweet fragrance of your humility, from his repose in the bosom of God into your most pure womb. Hence Bernardine de Bustis says that Mary merited more by that answer, “Behold the handmaid of the Lord,” than all creatures together could merit by all their works.
Thus, says St. Bernard, this innocent Virgin, although by her virginity she made herself dear to God, yet by her humility afterward made herself worthy—as far as a creature can make itself worthy—to be made the Mother of her Creator. Though she pleased God by her virginity, by her humility she conceived: Etsi placuit ex virginitate, tamen ex humilitate concepit. And St. Jerome confirms this, saying that God chose her for his Mother more for her humility than for all her other sublime virtues. Mary herself expressed this to St. Bridget, saying to her: How did I merit such a grace as to be made the Mother of my Lord, if not because I knew my nothingness and humbled myself? And she had declared the same before, in her canticle so full of the deepest humility, when she said: “Because he hath regarded the humility of his handmaid… He that is mighty hath done great things to me” (Luke 1:48–49). Upon which words St. Lawrence Justinian remarks that the Blessed Virgin does not say, he regarded my virginity, my innocence, but only my humility. And by this humility, as St. Francis de Sales observes, Mary did not intend to praise the virtue of her humility, but wished to proclaim that God had regarded her nothingness—humilitatem, id est nihilitatem, “her humility, that is, her nothingness”—and through his pure goodness had willed thus to exalt her.
In a word, St. Augustine says that the humility of Mary was like a ladder by which our Lord deigned to descend upon earth to become man in her womb. And St. Antoninus confirms this, saying that the humility of the Virgin was her most perfect and her most immediate preparation to become the Mother of God. And by this is explained what Isaias foretold: “And there shall come forth a rod out of the root of Jesse, and a flower shall rise up out of his root” (Isa. 11:1). Blessed Albert the Great remarks that the divine flower—namely, the only-begotten of God—according to Isaias, was to come forth not from the top or the trunk of the tree of Jesse, but from its root, which precisely denotes the humility of the Mother. And this is explained still more clearly by the Abbot of Celles: Observe, he says, that not from the top, but from the root, this flower is to spring up. And therefore our Lord said to his beloved daughter: “Turn away thy eyes from me, for they have made me flee away” (Cant. 6:4). And flee where, asks St. Augustine, unless from the bosom of the Father into the womb of Mary? Upon which the learned interpreter Fernandez observes that the most humble eyes of Mary, with which she always contemplated the divine greatness, never losing sight of her own nothingness, did such violence to God himself that they drew him into her womb. And by this we are to understand, says Franco the Abbot, why the Holy Spirit so greatly praised the beauty of this his spouse for her eyes, which were like those of a dove: “How beautiful art thou, my love! how beautiful art thou! thy eyes are doves’ eyes” (Cant. 4:1). For Mary, gazing on God with the eyes of a simple, humble dove, so enamored him of her beauty that with the bonds of love she made him a prisoner in her virginal womb. These are the words of the abbot: In what place on earth could so beautiful a virgin be found, who could allure the King of heaven by her eyes, and by a holy violence lead him captive, bound in the chains of charity? Let us conclude this point by remarking that Mary, in the incarnation of the Word, as we have seen from the beginning, could not have humbled herself more than she did. Let us now see how God could exalt her no higher than he did by making her his Mother.
Second Point. To comprehend the height to which Mary was raised, one would have to comprehend the sublime majesty and grandeur of God. It is enough, then, simply to say that God made this Virgin his Mother, for us to understand that God could not exalt her more than he did. Rightly did St. Arnold of Chartres affirm that God, by making himself the Son of the Virgin, established her in a rank above all the saints and angels: Maria constituta est super omnem creaturam. So that, next to God, she is incomparably higher than the heavenly spirits, as St. Ephrem asserts: she is, beyond all comparison, more glorious than all the rest of the host above. St. Andrew of Crete confirms this, saying: God excepted, she is the highest of all. And St. Anselm likewise says: O Lady, there is none equal to you; for every other being is either above you or beneath you. God alone is superior to you, and all others are inferior. So great, in a word, says St. Bernardine, is the exaltation of this Virgin, that God alone is able to comprehend it.
This removes the surprise expressed by some, remarks St. Thomas of Villanova, that the holy Evangelists, who have so fully recorded the praises of a Baptist and a Magdalen, have been so brief in describing the privileges of Mary. For, says the saint, it was enough to say of her that from her Jesus was born. What more would you have the Evangelists say, the saint continues, of the grandeur of this Virgin? Let it be enough for you that they attest her to be the Mother of God. Having recorded in these few words the greatest—indeed the whole—of her merits, they had no need to describe each one separately. And why not? Because, as St. Anselm answers, to say of Mary this alone, that she was the Mother of a God, transcends every glory that can be attributed to her, in thought or word, after God. Peter of Celles, dwelling on the same thought, adds: By whatever name you may wish to call her—whether Queen of heaven, Lady of the angels, or any other title of honor—you will never succeed in honoring her so much as by calling her simply the Mother of God.
The reason for this is plain; for, as the Angelic Doctor teaches, the nearer a thing approaches its source, the greater the perfection it receives from it. Therefore Mary, being the creature nearest to God, has shared more than all others in his grace, his perfection, and his greatness. To this Father Suarez traces the reason why the dignity of Mother of God is of an order superior to every other created dignity: because it belongs, in a certain manner, to the order of union with a divine Person, with which union it is necessarily connected. Hence St. Denis the Carthusian asserts that, after the hypostatic union, there is none more intimate than the union of the Mother of God with her Son. This, as St. Thomas teaches, is the highest union a pure creature can have with God. And Blessed Albert the Great affirms that to be the Mother of God is a dignity next to that of being God; therefore he says that Mary could not be more united to God than she was, without becoming God herself.
St. Bernardine affirms that, in order to become the Mother of God, it was needful that the holy Virgin should be raised to a certain equality with the divine Persons by a certain infinity of graces. And since children are esteemed morally one with their parents, so that their possessions and honors are held in common, St. Peter Damian says that, while God dwells in creatures in various ways, he dwelt in Mary in a singular manner of identity, making himself one with her. And he cries out in those celebrated words: Here let every creature be silent and tremble, and scarcely dare to behold the immensity of so great a dignity. God dwells in a virgin with whom he shares the identity of one nature.
St. Thomas asserts that Mary, being made the Mother of God, received—by reason of this close union with an infinite good—a certain infinite dignity, which Father Suarez calls infinite of its kind. The dignity of Mother of God is the highest dignity that can be conferred upon a pure creature. The Angelic Doctor teaches that, just as the humanity of Jesus Christ, though it might have received from God a greater habitual grace, could yet receive no greater perfection as to the union with a divine Person, so, on the other hand, the Blessed Virgin could receive no greater dignity than to be the Mother of God. For, since habitual grace is a created gift (this is his reasoning), we must acknowledge that its essence is finite. The capacity of every creature is limited in measure—which, however, does not prevent the divine power from being able to form another creature of greater capacity. Though the divine power may create something greater and better than the habitual grace of Christ, yet it could not destine it to anything greater than was the personal union of the only-begotten Son with the Father. The Blessed Virgin, because she is the Mother of God, has a certain infinite dignity from the infinite good, which is God; and in this respect nothing greater can be created. St. Thomas of Villanova says the same: Certainly there is something infinite in being the Mother of the Infinite. And St. Bernardine says that the state to which God exalted Mary as his Mother was the highest, so that he could exalt her no higher. And this is confirmed by Albert the Great: the Lord conferred upon the Blessed Virgin the highest gift of which any pure creature was capable—namely, the maternity of God.
Therefore St. Bonaventure wrote that celebrated saying: God could make a greater world and a greater heaven, but he could not exalt a creature to a greater excellence than by making her his Mother. But better than all others has the divine Mother herself described the height to which God has raised her, when she said: He that is mighty hath done great things to me—Fecit mihi magna qui potens est (Luke 1:49). And why did the holy Virgin never make known what those great favors were that God conferred upon her? St. Thomas of Villanova answers that Mary did not explain them because they were so great that they could not be explained.
St. Bernard, then, with reason says that God created the whole world for this Virgin who was to be his Mother: Propter hanc totus mundus factus est. And St. Bonaventure says that the preservation of the world is at the disposal of Mary; here the saint adheres to the words of Proverbs, which the Church applies to Mary: “I was with him forming all things” (Prov. 8:30). St. Bernardine adds that God, for love of Mary, did not destroy man after the sin of Adam. Hence the Church sings of Mary, with reason: “She has chosen the best part” (cf. Luke 10:42). For this virgin Mother not only chose the best things, but she chose the best part of the best things; the Lord bestowing upon her, in the highest degree—as Blessed Albert the Great attests—all the graces, and all the general and particular gifts conferred on every other creature, wholly in consequence of the dignity granted her of becoming the Mother of God.
Thus Mary was an infant, but of that state she had only the innocence, and not the defect of incapacity; for from the first moment of her life she always had the perfect use of reason. She was a virgin, but without the reproach of barrenness. She was a mother, but with the privilege of virginity. She was beautiful, even most beautiful, as Richard of St. Victor asserts, and likewise St. George of Nicomedia, and St. Dionysius the Areopagite, who—as many believe—once had the happiness of beholding her beauty, and said that, had not faith taught him she was a creature, he would have adored her as God. And the Lord himself revealed to St. Bridget that the beauty of his Mother surpassed the beauty of all men and angels, letting the saint hear him say to Mary: “Thy beauty exceeds that of all the angels and of all creatures.” She was most beautiful, I repeat, but without harm to those who looked upon her; for her beauty put impure emotions to flight, and even suggested pure thoughts, as St. Ambrose attests: So great was her grace that she not only preserved her own virginity, but also conferred a remarkable gift of purity on those who beheld her. And St. Thomas confirms this: the grace of sanctification not only repressed in the Virgin every unlawful impulse, but also had efficacy for others; so that, although she was beautiful in person, she never excited impure desires. Therefore she was called myrrh, which prevents corruption: “I yielded a sweet odor like the best myrrh” (cf. Ecclus. 24:20), as the holy Church applies the words to her. She was occupied in the active life, but her labor did not interrupt her union with God. In the contemplative life she was recollected in God, yet without neglect of temporal affairs and of the charity due to her neighbor. Death came upon her, but without its anguish, and without the corruption of the body.
To conclude, then: this divine Mother is infinitely inferior to God, but immeasurably superior to all creatures; and if it is impossible to find a Son more noble than Jesus, it is likewise impossible to find a Mother more noble than Mary. This should move the servants of such a Queen not only to rejoice in her greatness, but also to increase their confidence in her most powerful protection. For, being the Mother of God, says Father Suarez, she has a certain right to his gifts, to obtain them for those for whom she prays. St. Germanus, for his part, says that God cannot but hear the prayers of this Mother, for he cannot but acknowledge her as his true and immaculate Mother. Thus the saint says, addressing the Virgin: But you, who prevail with God by a maternal authority, even for those who grievously sin, obtain the great grace of reconciliation; for you cannot but be graciously heard, since God in all things conforms to your wishes as to those of a true and pure mother. Therefore, O Mother of God and our Mother, in you there is no lack of power to help us; and the will, too, is not wanting: Nec facultas, nec voluntas illi deesse potest. For you know, I will say with your servant the Abbot of Celles, that God did not create you for himself alone, but gave you to the angels for their restorer, to men for their deliverer, and to the demons for their conqueror; for by your means we recover divine grace, and by you the enemy is conquered and crushed.
And if we wish to please the divine Mother, let us often salute her by saying the “Hail Mary.” One day Mary appeared to St. Matilda and told her that no one could honor her better than by this salutation; and through it we shall certainly obtain special graces from this Mother of mercy, as the following example will show.
Example
A well-known incident is related by Father Paul Segneri in his Christian Instructed. A young man of Rome, of evil habits and laden with sins, went to confession to Father Nicholas Zucchi. The confessor received him kindly, had compassion on his misery, and told him that devotion to the Blessed Lady would free him from his accursed vices. He therefore imposed it on him as a penance that, until the time of his next confession, every morning and evening, on rising and going to bed, he should recite a “Hail Mary” to the Virgin, offering her his eyes, his hands, and his whole body, and praying her to keep him as her own; and that he should kiss the ground three times. The young man performed this penance, at first with very little improvement; but the father continued to urge him never to give it up, encouraging him to trust in the protection of Mary. Meanwhile, the penitent left home with some companions and traveled about the world for several years. Having returned to Rome, he went again to seek out his confessor, who, to his great joy and surprise, found him entirely changed and free from his former impurities. “My son,” he said, “how have you obtained from God so happy a change?” “Father,” answered the youth, “the Blessed Virgin, for that little devotion which you taught me, has obtained this grace for me.”
But the wonder did not end here. The same confessor related this fact from the pulpit. An officer who, for several years, had carried on a sinful relationship with a certain woman, heard it, and resolved to practice the same devotion himself, in order to free himself from that horrible bond which held him a slave of the devil (and such an intention is necessary for all such sinners, that the Virgin may aid them). And he too gave up his evil ways and changed his life. But what followed? At the end of six months, foolishly and too confidently trusting in his own strength, he wished one day to go and find that woman, to see whether she had also changed her way of life. But as he approached the door of her house, where he was in manifest danger of falling again into sin, he felt himself thrust back by an invisible force, and found himself as far from the house as the length of the whole street, standing before his own door. He was then enlightened to see clearly that Mary had thus rescued him from his ruin. Thus we perceive how watchful our good Mother is, not only to deliver us from sin if for that end we commend ourselves to her, but also to guard us from the danger of falling into it again.
Prayer
O immaculate and holy Virgin! O creature the most humble and the greatest before God! You were so small in your own eyes, but so great in the eyes of your Lord, that he exalted you even to choose you for his Mother, and so to make you Queen of heaven and earth. I thank, then, that God who has so highly exalted you, and I rejoice with you in seeing you so closely united to God that no greater union is permitted to a pure creature. I am ashamed to appear before you, who are so humble and adorned with so many graces—I, a miserable sinner, and so proud, with so many sins. But wretched as I am, I too wish to salute you: Hail, Mary, full of grace. You are already full of grace; obtain a share of it for me also. The Lord is with you. The Lord who has ever been with you, even from the first moment of your creation, is now more intimately with you, having made himself your Son. Blessed are you among women. O woman, blessed among all women, obtain for us also the divine benediction. And blessed is the fruit of your womb. O blessed plant, which has given to the world a fruit so noble and so holy! Holy Mary, Mother of God: O Mary, I confess that you are the true Mother of God, and for this truth I would give my life a thousand times. Pray for us sinners. But if you are the Mother of God, you are also the Mother of our salvation and of us poor sinners; since it was to save sinners that God made himself man, and he has made you his Mother that your prayers may have the power to save every sinner. Pray for us, then, O Mary. Now and in the hour of our death. Pray always: pray now, while we are in this life, amid so many temptations and so great a danger of losing God; but pray still more in the hour of our death, when we shall be on the point of leaving this world and being presented before the divine tribunal; that, being saved by the merits of Jesus Christ and by your intercession, we may one day come—without further danger of ever losing you—to salute you and praise you, with your Son, in heaven for all eternity. Amen.
Points for Reflection
1. “The more she is exalted by the angel, the more she humbles herself and considers her own nothingness.”
2. “Though she pleased God by her virginity, by her humility she conceived.”
3. “If it is impossible to find a Son more noble than Jesus, it is likewise impossible to find a Mother more noble than Mary.”