Happy, Happy Birthday, Our Dear Mama Mary!

For this special day, allow us to share some background information about Mama Mary’s birthday culled from various online sources.

The Church usually celebrates the feast day of saints on the date of their death since their "die natalis" is remembered as “their birth into everlasting happiness.”

Only St. John the Baptist and Mama Mary have their birthdays celebrated by the Church because of their invaluable mission for salvation history.

They alone were holy in their birth- “for Mary, her Immaculate Conception while John was sanctified in Saint Elizabeth's womb according to the traditional interpretation of Luke 1:15).”

Mama Mary’s nativity, the Marymas, is “a cause for great joy as it is considered the ‘dawn of our salvation.’ (Pope Paul VI in the Marialis Cultus, 1972).

A September birth was chosen for its symbolism that the "beginning" of the work of salvation should be commemorated near the beginning of the new year, which begins in September in the Eastern Church in Constantinople.

The September 8 date helped determine the Feast of the Immaculate Conception on December 8.

The earliest document commemorating this feast comes from the sixth century. It is generally believed that this feast originated in Jerusalem since there is evidence, in the fifth century, of a church dedicated to St. Anne, located north of the Temple in the neighborhood of the Pool of Bethesda which Sofronius, the Patriarch of Jerusalem, affirmed in 603 as the location of Mary's birth.

From the Eastern Church, this September 8 feast day was introduced in Rome during the seventh century. By 1007,the date became a holy day of obligation for the west,

There is no reference to the birth of Mama Mary in the Bible.

The book Apocrypha, principally the Protoevangelium of James dated prior to 200 AD gives a detailed account of Mama Mary’s birth.

Although not considered authoritative like the Bible, this book has influenced the Church’s traditional beliefs about the birth of Mama Mary.

Two important themes are connected to Mama Mary’s Nativity celebration.

Light is the primary theme portrayed in the liturgical celebration of this feast day: that the world had been in the darkness of sin and with the arrival of Mary begins a glimmer of light.

That light which appears at Mary's holy birth preannounces the arrival of Christ, the Light of the World. Her birth is the beginning of a better world: "Origo mundi melioris."

Saint Augustine connects Mama Mary’s birth with Jesus’ saving work: “She is the flower of the field from whom bloomed the precious lily of the valley. Through her birth the nature inherited from our first parents is changed.”

This antiphon for the Canticle of Zechariah at Morning Prayer expressed these sentiments:  "Your birth, O Virgin Mother of God, proclaims joy to the whole world, for from you arose the glorious Sun of Justice, Christ our God; He freed us from the age-old curse and filled us with holiness; he destroyed death and gave us eternal life."

Joy is the second theme of this September 8 celebration as this entrance antiphon at Mass states: "Let us celebrate with joyful hearts the birth of the Virgin Mary, of whom was born the Sun of Justice, Christ our Lord."

God’s election of Mama Mary which brought forth the Savior in the world will be a cause of joy for all generations, the primary reason for celebrating her birthday today.

This celebration is not so much about herself but about all the wonders and bountiful graces that God has done to her as Mama Mary herself proclaimed in her Magnificat: “From this day all generations will call me blessed, the Almighty has done great things for me, and holy is his Name.”