From Scripture to the Rosary, her constant ‘yes’ to Christ reveals an example for us to follow in daily life
There are many roads to understanding God’s love for us. For countless Catholics, Jesus’ mother Mary acts as a superhighway to encountering the Savior, with numerous side roads to bring people closer to Christ – from the Rosary to devotions and countless Biblical examples of present, compassionate love.
A statue of the Blessed Mother is crowned every May at the Diocesan Center in Harrisburg. In the Catholic Church, May is the month dedicated to Mary.“She had this incredible faith,” said Tanya Janoski, a spiritual director in the Diocese of Harrisburg. “That’s why the Church looks to Mary. She’s the greatest saint, the Immaculate Conception born without original sin.”
The Catholic Church uses May as the month to honor the Blessed Mother, a time that reveals the impact she made as the first to accept Jesus as her Lord and Savior, literally into her very body as her much-older cousin Elizabeth did with John the Baptist.
“You can’t get any more consolation than that, when an angel comes to you and tells you in proof that God can be trusted, that this plan for your life can be trusted,” said Alicia Barbers, a licensed social worker and part of the counseling team with Catholic Charities of Harrisburg.
“John the Baptist leaped when he sensed Mary’s presence within Elizabeth’s womb. And there again, Mary hadn’t even had Jesus yet. She was a young mother-to-be, yet she went on this long journey to visit her cousin Elizabeth,” Barbers said.
Barbers and Janoski share many instances of how accompaniment stood as one of Mary’s prime ways of ministering to those she loved, both in times of joy and the ultimate sorrow her son endured in his death on the cross.
“Mary draws us into a closer appreciation of what Christ suffered for us,” Barbers said.
“I can’t even imagine what Mary went through as she was witnessing the life events of Jesus, from the tender moments when he was a child, doing the typical mom things, nurturing him, caring for him, all the way up to the terrible suffering that she witnessed. I think about and contemplate what Christ suffered, his horrible, agonizing death. Not only during the crucifixion, but prior to that, (and) Mary plays a big role in that,” she said.
A stained-glass window of the Blessed Virgin Mary. Various devotions to Mary – including the Rosary, the Miraculous Medal and novenas – bring us closer to her Son, Jesus.“What she suffered in watching her son who was so innocent, her sweet, beautiful son who performs all these beautiful miracles, (who) brought peace, love and goodness everywhere he went, and then for her to watch these people attack her son, spit on him? I think as a mother, I’d be coming out swinging,” Janoski added.
“Yet she trusted. Mary really calls each one of us to a deepening faith in Christ,” she said.
Countless Catholics use the Rosary as an entry point to understanding Christ, a method that may include 53 Hail Marys, but which drives someone toward understanding the mysteries of Christ’s life, death and resurrection, and which Janoski says has been the driver of miracles in her life.
“I actually started praying the Rosary about 15 years ago because I was a catechist, (and) I’ve been praying it every day probably for more than a decade now because it grounds me,” Janoski said.
“If there’s something that’s on my mind, a concern, or someone I want to pray for, I always offer up my Rosary for that person, and I’ve seen miracles. I’ve seen people come back to the Church. I’ve seen mountains moved, tiny little things like habits done away with,” she said.
The Rosary also offers ways for us to contemplate our own journeys and struggles, and find fruit for inspiration to keep persevering in faith and in loving action as Christ did.
“Mary really calls each one of us to a deepening faith in Christ. ‘Look at my Son.’ No one had more faith than Mary (with) what she had to endure and watch,” Janoski said.
“When I think about my own family and some of the struggles with my children and my marriage, things that I go through as a mom and as a wife, I look right to Mary and think about how relatable she is just to my own life.”
Janoski reminds us, though, that all our prayer through Mary is meant to travel to God, the only one whom we truly worship, and she is a superhighway and not the divine destination.
“We’re not worshiping her. We’re honoring her because she is the first to say yes. She’s really teaching us what true obedience is about,” Janoski said.
“We’re looking at her and saying, ‘Wow, I want to emulate her.’”
Barbers and Janoski say that in Scripture, the Rosary and in countless ways the Blessed Mother has come to us through history, we can use her to bring us closer to her Son, our Brother and King, and to experience accompaniment in our battles that can bring grace far beyond ourselves.
“She was just that perfect example for us to follow,” Janoski said.
“When we’re not sure, what do we do? Look to Mary. She’s our greatest intercessor and our help. We’re her children. We really have this mother who’s in heaven and she’s just really going to bat for all of her children,” she said.
“By uniting our own sufferings to Jesus and Mary, our griefs can be transformed into powerful prayers and prayers for others,” Barbers said.
“God never wastes a prayer.”
(Jay Sorgi is a freelance reporter for The Catholic Witness.)
By Jay Sorgi, The Catholic Witness
