"Entering the new year, let us ask this holy Mother Mary , Mother of God to bless us. Let us ask Her to give us Jesus, our full Blessing, in whom the Father blessed all history once and for all, making it become the history of salvation " .
The first day of the New Year is a splendid opportunity to reflect on the marvel of the Word Made Flesh, and the woman He took His flesh from when He came among us. Is the moment to meditate upon Mary as the Mother of God , upon the most holy maternity .
Following the holy Fathers we teach with one voice that the Son [of God] and our Lord Jesus Christ is to be confessed as one and the same [Person], that he is perfect in Godhead and perfect in manhood, very God and very man, of a reasonable soul and [human] body consisting, consubstantial with the Father as touching his Godhead, and consubstantial with us as touching his manhood; made in all things like unto us, sin only excepted; begotten of his Father before the worlds according to his Godhead; but in these last days for us men and for our salvation born [into the world] of the Virgin Mary, the Mother of God according to his manhood. This one and the same Jesus Christ, the only-begotten Son [of God] must be confessed to be in two natures, unconfusedly, immutably, indivisibly, inseparably [united], and that without the distinction of natures being taken away by such union, but rather the peculiar property of each nature being preserved and being united in one Person and subsistence, not separated or divided into two persons, but one and the same Son and only-begotten, God the Word, our Lord Jesus Christ, as the Prophets of old time have spoken concerning him, and as the Lord Jesus Christ hath taught us, and as the Creed of the Fathers hath delivered to us.
from The Definition of the Council of Chalcedon, (451AD)
Many non Catholics ( or non-Othodoxs) seem to have a major problem with the Virgin Mary , true Mother of God . It is a problem that goes far beyond theological reason and debate. In some quarters there seems to be a major antipathy, almost hatred, directed at one of the key figures in the Redemption of mankind . But the answer is only in the scriptural basis of the Unity of God, the eternity of the Word and the Incarnation , only this is sufficient in itself to arrive at the conclusion that Mary is the Mother of God.
Let us therefore praise the Holy Mother of God , Mother of the Incarnation , let us pray to Mary , Mother of Jesus , true God and Redeemer of the World .
Hail, Mother and Virgin,
Eternal Temple of the Godhead,
Venerable Treasure of Creation,
crown of virginity,
support of the true faith,
on which the Church is founded throughout the world.
Mother of God,
who contained the infinite God
under your heart,
whom no space can contain:
through you the most Holy Trinity is revealed,
adored, and glorified,
demons are vanquished,
satan cast down from heaven into hell
and our fallen nature again assumed into heaven.
Through you the human race,
held captive in the bonds of idolatry,
arrives at the knowledge of Truth.
What more shall I say of you? Hail,
through whom kings rule,
through whom the Only-Begotten Son of God
has become the Star of Light
to those sitting in darkness
and in the shadow of death.
Amen .
( prayer of ~~ Saint Cyril of Alexandria ~~ )
