The United States, consecrated to Mary of the Immaculate Conception at her beginning

Homily
Solemnity of the Immaculate Conception
St. Lawrence Catholic Campus Center at the University of Kansas
8 December 2011
Daily Readings

Hail Mary, full of grace!  This is the angel's greeting to Mary, before Mary had any clue of what was about to happen, before she was overshadowed by the Holy Spirit and conceived Jesus in her womb.  Already, before any of that, the angel says Hail Mary, full of grace.  This astonishing statement should make us wonder - when did she become full of grace?

Today's Solemnity of the Immaculate Conception answers this question of when Mary became full of grace.  Our Church, comtemplating the words of the angel Gabriel to Mary for the first two millenia of Christianity, defined with theological precision and certainty in 1854 the dogma of the Immaculate Conception, that every Catholic can and must believe that Mary was conceived without sin, that she was full of grace from the first moment of Her conception.  This truly is theology at its very best, the faith of the Church seeking to understand the mysteries of revelation, even if it takes 1800 years to arrive at this understanding.

Defining Mary's sinlessnes from the first moment of her conception gives us a clue that God's plan from the beginning was not to use Mary in a minimum kind of way, like a temporary employee.  The angel's greeting was not - Hail Mary, who will be full of grace from the moment of Jesus' conception to the moment of His birth, or to the moment of his presentation or baptism.  No, his greeting was already Hail Mary, full of grace, before she conceived in her womb.  This clue that Mary was always full of grace, adopted by God in Jesus Christ not at baptism but at conception, to be holy and blameless before him, should tell us to expect what we have come to know about Mary, that if she always was full of grace, she will always be full of grace.  That grace that we celebrate today at the moment of her conception will not run out at the birth of Jesus, but will move Mary to say yes not only to the Annunciation, but yes to following her son to the foot of the cross, and yes to accepting the new mission to be the mother of all those destined for eternal life.

We will celebrate Mary, mother of sorrows at the cross, Mary, mother of the Church at Pentecost,  and Mary, Queen of heaven, on other occasions, showing that we know Mary once full of grace always is full of grace and always will be full of grace.  Today we celebrate precisely and simply that we know when Mary became full of grace.  It was at the moment of her conception, that God gave the merits of her Son's redemption to her, mysteriously preserving her from original sin.  This gift to Mary should make us excited to receive the same incomparable gift, and we are challenged in this Advent season to follow her example of making room in our hearts first for the coming of the infant Jesus in the flesh, the mystery of the Incarnation.

Aside from Christmas Day, today's Solemnity is the highest ranking non-Sunday celebration in the Church's United States calendar.  We never move this solemnity of our Lady, and never abrogate it.  For Our Lady under the title of the Immaculate Conception is the patroness of the United States America, and shame on us if we do not have a devotion to her under this title.  Lacking evidence of any other apostle making it to the shores of our great land, we recognize in Our Lady's gracious beginning in the womb of her mother Anne, the conception of the Church here in the United States through the Immaculate Conception of Mary, who is the apostle of the apostles.  Believing that Mary herself planted the faith here, and knowing that the first bishops of our country went to Rome with great joy for the proclamation of the dogma of the Immaculate Conception in Rome in 1854, eager to consecrate our country to Our Lady of the Immaculate Conception, we see from the beginning the special destiny of the United States and our Church to be a light to all nations through recourse to Mary.  In honoring and loving her, we honor and love her Son, who is so pleased that we know and love the one whom he knows and loves the best.  In consecrating ourselves and our country to her, we more closely imitate him,who rejoiced to always be completely dependent upon Mary as the Eve of the new creation.  In honoring her today, we become better disciples of him, who came into the world happy to dwell in the womb and nurse at the breasts of Mary, full of grace.  Amen.