MONTHLY DEVOTIONAL FOR 31st DECEMBER
December 31, 2023
Genesis 1:1
January 1, 2024
SOLEMNITY OF MARY, MOTHER OF GOD – 1st JANUARY
We celebrate the Feast of Mary, the Mother of God, today, on New Year’s Day, and pray that the Lord Jesus and His Mother Mary may enrich our lives during the New Year with an abundance of God’s blessings. Today’s Feast of Mary, the Mother of God is a very appropriate way to begin a new year. This celebration reminds us that the Blessed Virgin Mary, the Mother of God, is also our Heavenly Mother.
This is an occasion to renew our devotion to Mary, who is also Mother of the Church because she is our spiritual mother, and we are the Church. This celebration, in conformity with the ancient liturgy of the city of Rome, is meant to commemorate the part played by Mary in the mystery of salvation. It is meant also to exalt the singular dignity which this mystery brings to the holy Mother, through whom we were found worthy to receive the Author of life.
The Church puts the feast of this solemnity on the first day of the New Year to emphasize the importance of Mary’s role in the life of Christ and of the Church. We commemorate the various saints on different days of the year, but Mary is the most prominent of them all.
She has a special role and mission given to her by God. As Mother of our Redeemer and of the redeemed, she reigns as Queen at the side of Christ the King. She is a powerful intercessor for all of our needs here on earth. The Church observes this day also as the World Day of Peace and invites us to pray specially for peace in the world.
PRAYER :
Mary, Mother of God, the chosen and highly favored one of God our Father, your perfect obedience to God’s plan of Salvation and Redemption for mankind, made possible the miracle of Jesus’ birth into the world. Hence, you are the reason we are able to celebrate Christmas in commemoration of Jesus’ birth.
This amazing mystery of the Incarnation, that your child really is God, was conceived from the very first moment of his existence and throughout his human life. You, Mother, are the silent spectator of God taking on human flesh, preaching and bestowing upon us the Holy Spirit, through our baptism, offering his life for our freedom thus reconciling us with the Father, to an eternal sonship and inheritance in God’s kingdom.
The Incarnation, death and resurrection has restored God’s glory as a living God, active in human history, and that continues right up to today. Intercede for us, O Mother of God, in Jesus’ Name. Amen
WISH YOU ALL A VERY HAPPY AND BLESSED NEW YEAR!
