Mary's month ends

The Visitation of Our Lady was deliberately move in 1969 to associate it with May 31st, the day long connected with the celebration of Our Lady as Mediatrix of All Graces, as an appropriate conclusion of the May devotion.

The celebration of the Feast of the Visitation first occurred at a Franciscan Order General Chapter in 1263 and quickly spread throughout Europe. Since it is a celebration clearly described in the gospel, the churches of the Reformation were less inclined to proscribe it as they were other Marian feasts, particularly as it was the occasion for Mary to sing her great hymn of praise in honour of her Lord and God.

My ordaining bishop, John R.H. Moorman, in his "Path to Glory" comments on the Magnificat:

"Mary's first notes are of joy and praise for mercies which she herself has received. But she sees that beyond them, and because of them, lies a future in which God is at work in destroying the injustices from which men suffer - humiliating the proud and the mighty, and lifting up and tending the poor and the hungry. It is a forecast of the Kingdom of God on earth, a vision of a society under the perfect control of God and in which God reigns and rules. This is to be the fulfilment of the promises made to the fathers of the nation, now made possible through the obedience and loving trust of this simple village girl whom God has chosen as his fellow-worker.

Every time that we say or sing Magnificat we should think of Mary, not only for what she did but also for what she was. We should try, in our humble and limited way, to imitate her humility and willingness to work and to suffer in order that God's kingdom may come and his will be done in earth as in heaven. In the second half of this hymn we are given a glimpse of a world of justice and righteousness, the kind of world which, after nearly two thousand years of Redemption, should surely have been brought a little closer. Yet there is still great suffering, the proud unscattered and the mighty occupying the seats of tyranny and oppression, while millions die of malnutrition and despair.

Mary has given us a glimpse of the Kingdom of God. Its progress is now in our hands."