Remember, O most gracious Virgin Mary,

that never was it known that anyone who fled to your protection,

implored your help, or sought your intercession was left unaided.

Inspired with this confidence, I fly unto you,

O Virgin of virgins, my Mother.

To you I come, before you I stand, sinful and sorrowful.

O Mother of the Word incarnate, despise not my petitions,

but in your mercy hear and answer me. Amen.

As the year 2022 begins its unfolding of days, let us as Catholics place our lives under the care of the Most Blessed Mother Mary, Mother of God and our Mother. Since we have just recently come out of the year of St. Joseph in December, Who better to invoke as we begin this new year than Holy Mary, Mother of God?

She is our number one advocte when it comes to Jesus. I have read that every grace we receive from the Lord comes to us through Mary! All of our prayers and our petitions go to the Lord, but come to us through Her! Do you understand?? It is through the Blessed Mother that we receive all of our graces! Of course God does not have to do this, but because He loves His Mother so much, He chooses to allow His Mother to dispose of all the heavenly graces as She sees best.

It is a message we have heard from many popes, saints and even from the Blessed Virgin Herself! After one of the apparitions  of the Blessed Mother at Fatima to the shepherd children, Jacinta told Lucia: Tell everyone that Our Lord grants us all graces through the Immaculate Heart of Mary; that all must make their petitions to Her.”

Even though it is not an article of Faith, theologians and popes have written about Mary and Her role as “Mediatrix of all Graces.” In his Encyclical on the Rosary from Septmeber 22, 1891, Pope Leo XIII says:    “In a true and natural sense we may say that from the great treasury of graces that the Lord has merited for us, nothing came to us, by the will of God, except through Mary.”

St. Bernardine of Siena says that, “all graces of the spiritual life that descend from Christ, their Head, to the faithful, who are His mystical body, are transmitted by means of Mary… From the moment in which the Virgin Mother conceived the divine Word in Her womb, She acquired a special jurisdiction, so to say, over the gifts of the Holy Ghost; so that no creature has since received any grace from God, otherwise than by the hands of Mary… All gifts, all virtues, and all graces are dispensed by the hands of Mary, to whomsoever, when, and as She pleases… As God was pleased to dwell in the womb of this holy Virgin, She acquired, so to say, a kind of jurisdiction over all graces; for when Jesus Christ issued forth from Her most sacred womb, all the streams of divine gifts flowed from Her as from a celestial ocean.”

So as we begin this new year, continuing in our desire to become saints, let us follow the most perfect model that ever was created, and let us rest our weary eyes upon the beautiful face of Our Dear Mother. Let us contemplate Her unique role in the salvation of the world. Let is open our hearts, which are full of sin and imperfections. In humble trust and love let us hand over everything to Her….everything… so that just as She does with everything else, She may take what us there and with the special Grace that has been given to Her from her Son let us watch as She takes all that we offer Her and make it worthy to be placed before Her Son, Our Lord and Our God. Let us pray:  O Clement, O loving, O Sweet Virgin Mary, Pray for us O Holy Mother of God, that we may be made worthy of the promises of Christ.  Amen.