How Fitting It Was That Each of the Three Divine Persons Should Preserve Mary from Original Sin
Great was the ruin that accursed sin brought upon Adam and the whole human race. For when he so unhappily lost grace, he lost at the same time all the other blessings with which he had at first been enriched, and drew down upon himself and upon all his descendants both the displeasure of God and the whole flood of other evils. But God willed that the Blessed Virgin should be exempt from this common calamity, for he had destined her to be the Mother of the second Adam, Jesus Christ, who was to repair the injury done by the first. Let us see, then, how fitting it was that the three Divine Persons should preserve this Virgin from original sin. We shall see that it was fitting for the Father to preserve her from it as his daughter, for the Son as his Mother, and for the Holy Spirit as his spouse.
First Point. In the first place, it was fitting that the eternal Father should create Mary free from the original stain, because she was his daughter, and his first-born daughter, as she herself attests: “I came out of the mouth of the Most High, the first-born before all creatures” (Ecclus. 24:5)—a passage applied to Mary by the sacred interpreters, by the holy Fathers, and by the Church herself on the solemn festival of her Conception. Whether she be the first-born by reason of her predestination together with her Son in the divine decrees, before all creatures, as the school of the Scotists will have it, or the first-born of grace as predestined to be the Mother of the Redeemer after the foreseeing of sin, according to the school of the Thomists—all agree in calling her the first-born of God. And this being so, it was not fitting that Mary should ever be the slave of Lucifer, but that she should belong only and always to her Creator, as she herself asserts: “The Lord possessed me in the beginning of his ways” (Prov. 8:22). And so Mary was rightly called by Dionysius, Archbishop of Alexandria, una et sola filia vitae—“the one and only daughter of life”; differing in this from others, who, being born in sin, are daughters of death.
Moreover, it was fitting that the eternal Father should create her in his grace, since he destined her to be the restorer of the lost world and the mediatrix of peace between man and God; for so the holy Fathers name her, and especially St. John Damascene, who thus addresses her: “O blessed Virgin, you were born to procure the salvation of the whole world!” St. Bernard says that Mary was already prefigured in the ark of Noe; for as by the ark men were saved from the deluge, so by Mary we are saved from the shipwreck of sin—yet with this difference, that by the ark only a few were saved, but by Mary the whole human race has been redeemed. And so Mary is called by St. Athanasius “the new Eve, the Mother of life”—a new Eve, because the first was the mother of death, while the most holy Virgin is the Mother of life. St. Theophanes, Bishop of Nicaea, exclaims: “Hail to you, who have taken away the sorrow of Eve!” St. Basil calls her “the peacemaker between God and men,” and St. Ephrem “the peacemaker of the whole world.”
Now surely one who treats of peace must not be an enemy of the offended party, still less an accomplice in his crime. St. Gregory says that to appease a judge his enemy must certainly not be chosen, for instead of appeasing him such a one would only enrage him the more. Therefore, since Mary was to be the mediatrix of peace between God and man, there was every reason why she should not appear as a sinner and an enemy of God, but as his friend and pure from sin.
Besides, it was fitting that God should preserve her from original sin, since he destined her to crush the head of the infernal serpent, who, by seducing our first parents, brought death upon all men, as the Lord foretold: “I will put enmities between thee and the woman, and thy seed and her seed; she shall crush thy head” (Gen. 3:15). Now if Mary was to be the strong woman brought into the world to crush Lucifer, surely it was not fitting that she should first be conquered by Lucifer and made his slave, but rather that she should be free from every stain and from all subjection to the enemy. In his pride he had already corrupted the whole human race, and he would have corrupted the pure soul of this Virgin as well. But blessed forever be the divine goodness, which forestalled her with so much grace, so that, remaining free from every stain of sin, she might overthrow and confound his pride—as St. Augustine says, or whoever was the author of that commentary on Genesis: “Since the devil was the head from which original sin proceeded, that head Mary crushed; because no subjection to sin ever entered the soul of the Virgin, and therefore she was free from every stain.” St. Bonaventure expresses the same still more clearly: “It was fitting that the Blessed Virgin Mary, by whom our shame was to be taken away, should so conquer the devil that she should not yield to him in the least degree.”
But it was especially fitting that the eternal Father should preserve his daughter from Adam’s sin because he destined her to be the Mother of his only-begotten Son. St. Bernardine of Siena says: “You were preordained in the mind of God, before every creature, to bring forth God himself made man.” If for no other reason, then, at least for the honor of his Son, who is God, the Father would create her pure from every stain. The angelic Doctor St. Thomas says that all things ordained for God must be holy and pure from every defilement. If David, when planning the temple of Jerusalem with a magnificence worthy of the Lord, said, “the house is prepared not for man, but for God” (1 Par. 29:1), how much greater reason have we to believe that the great Creator, having destined Mary to be the Mother of his own Son, would adorn her soul with every grace, that it might be a worthy dwelling-place for a God! “God, the maker of all things,” affirms blessed Denis the Carthusian, “being about to construct a worthy dwelling for his Son, adorned her with the abundance of every pleasing gift.” And the holy Church herself assures us of this when she affirms that God prepared the body and soul of the Virgin to be on earth a dwelling worthy of his only-begotten Son. “Almighty and eternal God,” thus the Church prays, “who, by the cooperation of the Holy Spirit, did prepare the body and soul of the glorious Virgin Mother, that she might become a worthy dwelling for your Son…”
It is acknowledged to be the greatest glory of sons to be born of noble parents: “The glory of children are their fathers” (Prov. 17:6). And so, in the world, the reproach of small fortune or little learning is more easily borne than that of low birth; for the poor man may grow rich by industry, and the ignorant learned by study, but he who is of low birth can hardly become noble, and if ever he does, the old reproach is always liable to be revived. How then can we believe that God, when he was able to give his Son a noble Mother by preserving her from sin, would have consented that he should be born of a Mother defiled with sin, and have allowed Lucifer to reproach him with the shame of being born of a Mother who had once been his slave and an enemy of God? No, the Lord did not permit this. He provided well for the honor of his Son by ordaining that his Mother should always be immaculate, that she might be a fit Mother for such a Son. The Greek Church confirms this: “By a singular providence God ordained that the most holy Virgin should be perfectly pure from the very beginning of her life, as became her who was to be a Mother worthy of Christ.”
It is a common axiom among theologians that no gift was ever granted to any creature with which the Blessed Virgin was not also enriched. St. Bernard expresses it thus: “We certainly cannot suppose that what has been bestowed even upon a few mortals should have been withheld from so great a Virgin.” And St. Thomas of Villanova says: “Nothing was ever given to any of the saints that did not shine more eminently in Mary from the beginning of her life.” And if it is true, according to the celebrated saying of St. John Damascene, that “there is an infinite distance between the Mother of God and the servants of God,” then it must certainly be supposed, as St. Thomas teaches, that God conferred graces of every kind more abundantly on the Mother than on the servants. Now, asks St. Anselm, the great defender of the privileges of the immaculate Mary—this being granted, was the wisdom of God unable to prepare a pure dwelling for his Son, free from every human stain? Was it in the power of God, St. Anselm continues, to preserve the angels of heaven unstained amid the ruin of so many, and could he not preserve the Mother of his Son and the Queen of angels from the common fall of man? Could God, I add, give even an Eve the grace to come into the world immaculate, and afterward be unable to bestow it on Mary?
Ah no—God could do it, and he did it; since it was altogether fitting, as the same St. Anselm says, that this Virgin, to whom God was to give his only Son, should be adorned with such purity that it should not only surpass the purity of all men and all angels, but be second in greatness only to that of God. And still more plainly does St. John Damascene declare that God preserved both the soul and the body of this Virgin, as became her who was to receive God into her womb; for he, being holy, dwells only with the holy. Thus the eternal Father could say to this beloved daughter: “As the lily among thorns, so is my love among the daughters” (Cant. 2:2). Daughter among all my other daughters, you are like a lily among thorns; for they are all stained by sin, but you were ever immaculate, and ever my friend.
Second Point. In the second place, it was fitting for the Son that Mary, as his Mother, should be preserved from sin. It is not granted to other children to choose a mother according to their liking; but if it were ever granted to anyone, who would choose a slave for his mother when he might have a queen? Who a peasant, when he might have a noblewoman? Who an enemy of God, when he might have a friend of God? If, then, the Son of God alone could choose a mother according to his pleasure, we may hold it certain that he would choose one befitting a God. So St. Bernard expresses it: “The Maker of men, who was to be born of man, had to choose for himself such a mother as he knew was fitting for him.” And since it was indeed fitting that a most pure God should have a mother pure from all sin, such was she created, as St. Bernardine of Siena says in these words: “The third kind of sanctification is that which is called maternal, and this removes every stain of original sin. This was in the Blessed Virgin; for God created her, both by the nobility of her nature and by the perfection of her grace, such as it was fitting that his Mother should be.” Here the words of the Apostle may be applied: “For it was fitting that we should have such a high priest, holy, innocent, undefiled, separated from sinners” (Heb. 7:26). A learned author remarks here that, according to St. Paul, it was fitting that our Redeemer should be separated not only from sin but also from sinners, as St. Thomas explains it: “It was fitting that he who came to take away sins should be separated from sinners as regards the sin of which Adam was guilty.” But how could it be said of Jesus Christ that he was separated from sinners, if his Mother was a sinner?
St. Ambrose says: “Not from earth, but from heaven, did Christ choose this vessel through which he should descend, and he consecrated the temple of modesty.” The saint alludes to the words of St. Paul: “The first man was of the earth, earthly; the second man, from heaven, heavenly” (1 Cor. 15:47). St. Ambrose calls the divine Mother a heavenly vessel—not that Mary was other than earthly in her nature, as heretics have sometimes imagined, but heavenly through grace; for she was superior to the angels of heaven in holiness and purity, as was fitting, since a King of glory was to dwell in her womb. So John the Baptist revealed to St. Bridget: “It was fitting that the King of glory should rest in no vessel but one purer and more chosen than all angels and men.” To this we may add what the eternal Father himself said to the same saint: “Mary was a vessel clean, and not clean: clean, because she was wholly fair; but not clean, because she was born of sinners—although she was conceived without sin, that my Son might be born of her without sin.” These last words deserve note: that Mary was conceived without sin so that the divine Son might be conceived without sin—not that Jesus Christ could ever contract sin, but that he might not suffer the reproach of having a Mother infected with sin and a slave of the devil.
The Holy Spirit says that the honor of the father is the glory of the son, and the dishonor of the father is the shame of the son (cf. Sir. 3:13). And St. Augustine says that Jesus preserved the body of Mary from corruption after death, since it would have dishonored him had corruption destroyed that virginal flesh from which he had clothed himself. Corruption is the reproach of the human condition, from which the nature of Mary was exempted, so that Jesus might be exempt from it; for the flesh of Jesus is the flesh of Mary. Now, if it would have been a dishonor for Jesus Christ to be born of a mother whose body was subject to the corruption of the flesh, how much greater would the shame have been had he been born of a mother whose soul was corrupted by sin? Moreover, since it is true that the flesh of Jesus is the same as that of Mary—so much so (as the saint himself adds) that the flesh of the Savior, even after his resurrection, was the very same that he had received from his Mother—St. Arnold of Chartres therefore says: “The flesh of Mary and of Christ is one; and so I judge the glory of the Son to be not so much common to both as one and the same.” This being true, if the Blessed Virgin had been conceived in sin, then, even though the Son had contracted no stain of sin, there would always have been some stain from his union with flesh that had once been infected with guilt—a vessel of uncleanness and a slave of Lucifer.
Mary was not only the Mother but a worthy Mother of the Savior. So all the holy Fathers name her. St. Bernard says: “You alone were found worthy that in your virginal hall the King of kings should choose his first dwelling.” And St. Thomas of Villanova: “Before she had conceived, she was already fit to be the Mother of God.” The holy Church herself attests that the Virgin merited to be the Mother of Jesus Christ. Explaining this, St. Thomas Aquinas remarks that Mary could not merit the Incarnation of the Word, but by divine grace she merited such perfection as would render her worthy to become the Mother of a God; as St. Peter Damian also writes: “Her singular holiness merited—out of pure grace—that she alone should be judged worthy to receive a God.”
Now, this being granted, that Mary was a Mother worthy of God, what excellence and what perfection, asks St. Thomas of Villanova, were fitting for her! The same angelic Doctor declares that when God chooses anyone for a certain dignity, he also makes him fit for it; and so, he says, God having chosen Mary for his Mother, certainly rendered her worthy of it by his grace, according to what the angel said to her: “Thou hast found grace with God; behold, thou shalt conceive…” (Luke 1:30–31). And from this the saint concludes that the Virgin never committed any actual sin, not even a venial sin; otherwise, he says, she would not have been a worthy Mother of Jesus Christ, since the disgrace of the mother would also be that of the Son, if his Mother had been a sinner. Now, if Mary, by committing even one venial offense—which does not deprive the soul of divine grace—might be said not to have been a worthy Mother of God, how much more if she had been stained with original sin, which would have made her an enemy of God and a slave of the devil! Therefore St. Augustine says, in a celebrated passage of his writings, that when speaking of Mary he would make no mention of sins, for the honor of that Lord whom she merited for her Son, and through whom she had the grace to conquer sin in every way.
We should therefore hold it for certain that the incarnate Word chose for himself a befitting Mother, one of whom he need not be ashamed, as St. Peter Damian expresses it. And St. Proclus too: “He dwelt within that womb which he had created so as to be free from any mark of infamy.” Jesus felt it no reproach to hear himself called by the Jews the son of a poor woman: “Is not his mother called Mary?” (Matt. 13:55); for he came on earth to give an example of humility and patience. But on the other hand, it would surely have been a reproach to him if the demons could have said: “Was he not born of a mother who was a sinner, and once our slave?” It would be thought most unfitting that Jesus Christ should be born of a woman deformed and maimed in body, or possessed by evil spirits; but how much more unseemly that he should be born of a woman once deformed in soul, and possessed by Lucifer!
Ah, that God who is wisdom itself well knew how to prepare on earth a fit dwelling for himself to inhabit: “Wisdom hath built herself a house” (Prov. 9:1). “The Most High hath sanctified his own tabernacle… God will help it in the morning early” (Ps. 45:5–6). The Lord, says David, sanctified this his dwelling “in the morning early”—that is, from the beginning of her life—to make her worthy of himself; for it was not fitting that a God who is holy should choose a house that was not holy: “Holiness becometh thy house” (Ps. 92:5). And if he himself declares that he will never enter into a malicious soul, nor dwell in a body subject to sins (Wisd. 1:4), how can we think that the Son of God would have chosen to inhabit the soul and body of Mary without first sanctifying her and preserving her from every stain of sin? For, as St. Thomas teaches us, the eternal Word inhabited not only the soul but also the body of Mary. The Church too sings: Non horruisti Virginis uterum—“You did not shrink from the Virgin’s womb.” Indeed, a God would have shrunk from incarnating himself in the womb of an Agnes, a Gertrude, a Teresa, since those virgins, holy though they were, were for a time stained with original sin; but he did not shrink from becoming man in the womb of Mary, because this chosen Virgin was always pure from every guilt, and never possessed by the infernal serpent. Hence St. Augustine wrote: “The Son of God built himself no dwelling more worthy than Mary, who was never captured by the enemy nor robbed of her ornaments.”
On the other hand, St. Cyril of Alexandria says: “Who ever heard of an architect who built a house for his own use, and then gave the first possession of it to his greatest enemy?” Certainly our Lord, who, as St. Methodius declares, gave us the command to honor our parents, would not fail, when he became man like ourselves, to observe it himself by bestowing on his Mother every grace and honor. Hence St. Augustine says that we must certainly believe Jesus Christ preserved the body of Mary from corruption after death, as was said above; for had he not done so, he would not have observed the law, which, as it commands respect to the mother, so also condemns disrespect. How much less mindful would Jesus have been of his Mother’s honor had he not preserved her from the sin of Adam! That Son would indeed commit a sin, says Father Thomas of Strasbourg, an Augustinian, who, being able to preserve his Mother from original sin, should fail to do so; and what would be sinful in us cannot be thought befitting the Son of God—namely, that he should not have created his Mother immaculate when he was able to do so. Ah no, exclaims Gerson: since you, the supreme Prince, willed to have a mother, honor is certainly due to her from you; but this law would not appear well fulfilled if you should permit her, who was to be the dwelling of all purity, to fall into the abomination of original sin.
Moreover, the divine Son, as we know, came into the world to redeem Mary before all others, as we read in St. Bernardine of Siena. And as there are two ways of redeeming, as St. Augustine teaches—one by raising the fallen, the other by preventing from falling—the latter is doubtless the nobler. “More nobly is he redeemed,” says St. Antoninus, “who is kept from falling than he who is raised after falling”; because in this way is avoided the injury or stain that the soul always contracts by a fall. Therefore we ought to believe that Mary was redeemed in the nobler manner, as became the Mother of a God, as St. Bonaventure expresses it (for Frassen proves that the sermon on the Assumption was written by that holy doctor): “We must believe that by a new manner of sanctification the Holy Spirit redeemed her at the first moment of her conception, and preserved her by a special grace from the original sin which was not in her, but would otherwise have been in her.” On this subject Cardinal Cusano has elegantly written: “Others have had a deliverer, but the holy Virgin had a pre-deliverer”; others have had a Redeemer to deliver them from sin already contracted, but the holy Virgin had a Redeemer who, because he was her Son, preserved her from ever contracting it.
In a word—to conclude this point—Hugh of St. Victor says that the tree is known by its fruit: if the Lamb was always immaculate, the Mother also must always have been immaculate. Hence this same doctor saluted Mary, calling her O digna digni—“the worthy Mother of a worthy Son”; meaning that none but Mary was the worthy Mother of such a Son, and none but Jesus the worthy Son of such a Mother. Therefore let us say with St. Ildephonsus: “Give suck, then, O Mary, give suck to your Creator; give suck to him who made you, and made you so pure and perfect that he should receive from you human nature.”
Third Point. If, then, it was fitting for the Father to preserve Mary from sin as his daughter, and for the Son because she was his Mother, it was fitting also for the Holy Spirit to preserve her as his spouse. Mary, says St. Augustine, was the only one who merited to be called the Mother and the spouse of God. For, as St. Anselm affirms, the Holy Spirit came bodily upon Mary and rested in her, enriching her with grace beyond all creatures, dwelt in her, and made his spouse the Queen of heaven and earth. He came upon her bodily—that is, as to the effect—since he came to form from her immaculate body the immaculate body of Jesus Christ, as the archangel foretold: “The Holy Ghost shall come upon thee” (Luke 1:35). For this reason, says St. Thomas, Mary is called the temple of the Lord and the sanctuary of the Holy Spirit, because by the operation of the Holy Spirit she was made Mother of the incarnate Word.
Now, if a skilled painter were allowed to choose a bride as beautiful or as ill-favored as he himself might paint her, how great would be his care to make her as beautiful as possible! Who, then, will say that the Holy Spirit did not deal thus with Mary, and that, having it in his power to make this his spouse as beautiful as it befitted her to be, he failed to do so? No—thus it was fitting that he should do, and thus he did, as the Lord himself attested when, praising Mary, he said to her: “Thou art all fair, O my love, and there is not a spot in thee” (Cant. 4:7). These words, as we learn from à Lapide, St. Ildephonsus, and St. Thomas, are properly to be understood of Mary; and St. Bernardine of Siena and St. Lawrence Justinian also declare that the passage is precisely to be understood of her immaculate conception. Hence Raymond Jordan (who through humility called himself “the Idiot”) says: “You are all fair, O most glorious Virgin—not in part, but wholly; and the stain of sin, whether mortal, venial, or original, is not in you.”
The Holy Spirit signifies the same thing when he calls this his spouse “a garden enclosed, a fountain sealed up” (Cant. 4:12). Mary, says St. Jerome, was truly this enclosed garden and sealed fountain; for the enemies never entered to harm her, but she remained always uninjured, holy in soul and body. In like manner St. Bernard, addressing the Blessed Virgin, said: “You are an enclosed garden, into which the sinner’s hand never entered to rob it of its flowers.”
We know that this divine spouse loved Mary more than all the other saints and angels together, as Father Suarez, St. Lawrence Justinian, and others affirm. He loved her from the beginning, and exalted her in holiness above all creatures, as David expresses it: “The foundations thereof are in the holy mountains; the Lord loveth the gates of Sion above all the tabernacles of Jacob… This man is born in her, and the Highest himself hath founded her” (Ps. 86:1–2, 5)—all of which signifies that Mary was holy from her conception. The same is signified by what the Holy Spirit says in another place: “Many daughters have gathered together riches; thou hast surpassed them all” (Prov. 31:29). If Mary has surpassed all in the riches of grace, then she possessed original justice, as Adam and the angels had it. “There are young maidens without number; one is my dove, my perfect one” (the Hebrew reads, “my uncorrupted, my immaculate”); “she is the only one of her mother” (Cant. 6:8). All just souls are children of divine grace; but among them Mary was the Dove without the bitter gall of sin, the Perfect One without the stain of original sin, the one conceived in grace.
The angel, therefore, before she was the Mother of God, already found her full of grace, and so saluted her: “Hail, full of grace” (Luke 1:28). Commenting on these words, Sophronius writes that to the other saints grace is given in part, but to the Virgin it was given in its fullness. So that, as St. Thomas says, grace made holy not only the soul but also the flesh of Mary, that with it the Virgin might clothe the eternal Word. From all this we are to understand, as Peter of Celle remarks, that Mary, from the moment of her conception, was enriched by the Holy Spirit and filled with divine grace. Hence, as St. Peter Damian says, “she, being chosen and pre-chosen by God, was carried off wholly to himself by the Holy Spirit”—carried off, as the saint expresses it, to convey the swiftness with which the Divine Spirit made her his spouse, before Lucifer should take possession of her.
I will at last close this discourse, on which I have dwelt more fully than on the others, because our little congregation has for its principal protectress the most holy Virgin Mary, precisely under this title of her immaculate conception. I will close, then, by setting down in a few words the reasons that make me certain, and that should make everyone certain, of this pious belief so glorious to the divine Mother: that she was free from original sin.
There are many doctors who hold that Mary was even exempt from contracting the debt of sin—among them Cardinal Galatino, Cardinal Cusano, De Ponte, Salazar, Catharinus, Novarino, Viva, De Lugo, Egidius, Richelius, and others. Now this opinion is very probable; for if it is true that in the will of Adam, as head of the human race, the wills of all were included—as Gonet, Habert, and others hold to be probable, on the testimony of those words of St. Paul, “in whom (Adam) all have sinned” (Rom. 5:12)—if this is probable, then it is also probable that Mary did not contract the debt of sin; for God having so greatly distinguished her above the rest of mankind in the order of grace, it should be piously believed that the will of Mary was not included in the will of Adam.
This opinion is only probable, yet I hold to it, as being more glorious to my Lady. But I hold it for certain that Mary did not contract the sin of Adam, as Cardinal Everard, Duval, Raynaud, Lossada, Viva, and many others hold for certain, and even as “proximately definable” as an article of faith, as they put it. I pass over, however, the revelations that confirm this opinion—especially those made to St. Bridget, approved by Cardinal Torquemada and by four supreme Pontiffs, which we read in various places of the sixth book of those revelations. But I cannot omit to mention here the testimony of the holy Fathers on this point, to show how uniform they have been in granting this privilege to the divine Mother. St. Ambrose says: “Receive me not from Sarah, but from Mary, that she may be an uncorrupted Virgin—a Virgin preserved by grace, whole and free from every stain of sin.” Origen, speaking of Mary, says: “Neither was she infected by the breath of the venomous serpent.” And St. Ephrem: “She is immaculate, and most remote from every taint of sin.” St. Augustine, meditating on the angel’s words, “Hail, full of grace,” says: “By these words he shows her to be wholly”—note, wholly—“excluded from the wrath of the first sentence, and restored to the full grace of benediction.” St. Jerome: “That cloud was never in darkness, but always in the light.” St. Cyprian (or whoever is the author of that treatise) says: “Justice did not suffer that vessel of election to be exposed to the common injuries; for, being far exalted above the rest, she shared their nature, but not their guilt.” St. Amphilochius also says: “He who created the first virgin without reproach also fashioned the second without stain or crime.” Sophronius: “She is called the immaculate Virgin, because she was in no way corrupted.” St. Ildephonsus: “It is certain that she was exempt from original sin.” St. John Damascene: “To this paradise the serpent had no entrance.” St. Peter Damian: “The flesh of the Virgin, taken from Adam, did not admit the stain of Adam.” St. Bruno: “This is that uncorrupted earth which the Lord blessed, and which is therefore free from all contagion of sin.” St. Bonaventure, too: “Our Lady was full of prevenient grace in her sanctification—that is, of grace preservative against the defilement of original sin.” St. Bernardine of Siena: “It is not to be believed that the Son of God himself would choose to be born of a Virgin and to take her flesh, if she were defiled in any way with original sin.” St. Lawrence Justinian: “From her conception she was forestalled with blessing.” So the Idiot, upon the words “Thou hast found grace,” says: “You have found a singular grace, O most sweet Virgin, for you were preserved from the original stain.” And many other doctors say the same.
But two arguments conclusively prove the truth of this opinion. The first is the universal consent of the faithful on this point. Father Egidius of the Presentation asserts that all the religious orders follow this same opinion; and although in the Order of St. Dominic, says a modern author, there are ninety-two writers of the contrary opinion, yet one hundred and thirty-six are of ours. But what should especially persuade us that our pious opinion agrees with the common opinion of Catholics is the declaration of Pope Alexander VII in the celebrated bull Sollicitudo omnium ecclesiarum, issued in the year 1661: “This devotion and worship toward the Mother of God increased and was propagated anew… so that, the universities having embraced this opinion” (that is, the pious one), “now almost all Catholics embrace it.” And in fact this opinion is defended by the universities of the Sorbonne, of Alcalá, of Salamanca, of Coimbra, of Cologne, of Mainz, and of Naples, and by many others, in which everyone who graduates binds himself by oath to defend the immaculate Mary. The learned Petavius rests his proof of the immaculate conception chiefly upon this argument from the common consent of the faithful. And this argument, writes the learned Bishop Julius Torni, cannot fail to convince; for if nothing else—if the common consent of the faithful makes us certain of the sanctification of Mary in the womb and of the glorious assumption of her soul and body into heaven—why should not this same common sentiment make us certain of her immaculate conception?
By another reason, still stronger than the first, we are assured of the truth that the Virgin is exempt from the original stain: namely, the festival instituted by the universal Church in honor of her immaculate Conception. On the one hand, I see that the Church celebrates the first moment in which her soul was created and infused into the body, as Alexander VII declares in the bull quoted above, in which it is stated that the Church prescribes for the conception of Mary the same veneration that the pious opinion grants to her, which holds her to have been conceived without original sin. On the other hand, I know it to be certain that the Church cannot honor anything unholy, according to the decrees of the sovereign pontiffs St. Leo and St. Eusebius: “In the Apostolic See the Catholic religion has always been preserved free from stain.” And all the theologians, including St. Augustine, St. Bernard, and St. Thomas, teach the same. St. Thomas in particular makes use of the argument from the feast of her birth, instituted by the Church, to prove that Mary was sanctified before birth, and so he says: “The Church celebrates the nativity of the Blessed Virgin; but no feast is celebrated in the Church except in honor of some saint; therefore the Blessed Virgin was sanctified in the womb.” Now, if it is certain, as the angelic Doctor declares, that Mary was sanctified in the womb because the holy Church celebrates her birth, why should we not then hold it for certain that Mary was preserved from original sin from the first moment of her conception, now that we know the Church herself celebrates the festival of it in this very sense?
In confirmation, too, of this great privilege of Mary, it is well known how many remarkable graces our Lord has been pleased to dispense daily in the kingdom of Naples through the little pictures of the Virgin of the Immaculate Conception. I could relate many that took place under the very eyes of the fathers of our own congregation; but I will tell only two, which are truly wonderful.
Example
There came a woman to one of the houses of our little congregation, in this kingdom, to tell one of the fathers that her husband had not been to confession for many years, and that she did not know how to bring him back to his duty; for whenever she spoke to him of confession, he beat her. The father told her to give him a little picture of Mary immaculate. Evening came, and the woman again begged her husband to go to confession; but the man being as deaf to her as before, she gave him the picture. No sooner had he received it than he said: “When will you take me to confession, for I am ready?” The wife, at this sudden change, wept for joy. In the morning he came to our church, and when the father asked him how long it had been since his last confession, he answered: “Twenty-eight years.” “And what has brought you to confession this morning?” asked the father. “Father,” he said, “I was obstinate; but yesterday my wife gave me a picture of the Madonna, and at once I felt my heart changed, so that last night seemed to me a thousand years long, and I thought the day would never come when I might go to confession.” He made his confession with great compunction, changed his life, and continued for a long time to go often to confession to the same father.
In another place, in the diocese of Salerno, during one of our missions, there was a man who bore a great hatred against one who had offended him. One of our fathers spoke to him and urged him to pardon his enemy. “Father,” he answered, “have you ever seen me at the sermon? No, you have not; and for this very reason I stay away. I see that I am damned, but I do not wish it otherwise—I must have my revenge.” The father did all he could to convert him; but finding that he was wasting his words, he said: “Take this little picture of the Madonna.” “What use,” said the man, “is this picture?” Yet he took it; and as though he had never refused to pardon his enemy, he said to the missionary: “Father, do you wish anything more than a reconciliation? For that I am ready.” The next morning was appointed for the reconciliation; but when the morning came, his mind had changed, and he would do nothing. The father offered him another picture. He did not want it, and took it unwillingly; but no sooner had he taken it than he immediately said: “Let us be reconciled. Where is the notary?” He then forgave his enemy, and afterward made his confession.
Prayer
Ah, my immaculate Lady, I rejoice with you, beholding you endowed with such great purity. I give thanks, and resolve always to give thanks, to our common Creator for having preserved you from every stain of sin, as I most certainly believe; and to defend this great and singular privilege of your immaculate conception I am ready, and swear, to give even my life, if it be necessary. I would that all the world might know you and acknowledge you as that beautiful dawn which was always resplendent with the divine light; that chosen ark of salvation, safe from the common shipwreck of sin; that perfect and immaculate dove, as your divine spouse declared you to be; that enclosed garden which was the delight of God; that sealed fountain which the enemy never entered to trouble; and, in a word, that spotless lily which you are, springing up among the thorns of the children of Adam. For whereas all are born defiled with original sin and enemies of God, you were born pure, all spotless, and in all things a friend of your Creator.
Let me, then, also praise you, as your God himself praised you when he said: “Thou art all fair, and there is not a spot in thee”—Tota pulchra es, et macula non est in te. O most pure dove, all white, all beautiful, and always the friend of God—O quam pulchra es, amica mea, quam pulchra es! O most sweet, most lovable, immaculate Mary, you who are so beautiful in the eyes of our Lord, do not disdain to look with your pitying eye upon the loathsome wounds of my soul. Behold me, pity me, and heal me. O powerful magnet of hearts, draw also my miserable heart to yourself. You who even from the first moment of your life were pure and beautiful in the sight of God, have pity on me; for I was not only born in sin, but after baptism I again defiled my soul with sin. Will God, who chose you for his child, his Mother, and his spouse, and therefore preserved you from every stain and preferred you in his love above all creatures, refuse you any grace? Immaculate Virgin, you must save me. I will say to you with St. Philip Neri: make me always to remember you, and do not forget me. It seems to me a thousand years before I shall go to behold your beauty in paradise, there to praise and love you more, my Mother, my Queen, my beloved—most lovely, most sweet, most pure, immaculate Mary. Amen.
Points for Reflection
1. “It was not fitting that Mary should ever be the slave of Lucifer, but that she should belong only and always to her Creator.”
2. “The Son of God built himself no dwelling more worthy than Mary, who was never captured by the enemy nor robbed of her ornaments.”
3. “Others have had a Redeemer to deliver them from sin already contracted, but the holy Virgin had a Redeemer who, because he was her Son, preserved her from ever contracting it.”