Page 22 - 聖母軍團員手冊（英文版，2014年5月-2022年1月更新版）

Legion HANDBOOK D10944_1 26/02/2014 15:53 Page 21

CHAPTER 5 THE DEVOTIONAL OUTLOOK OF THE LEGION 21
“The sacred writings of the Old and New Testaments, as well as
venerable tradition, show the role of the Mother of the Saviour in the
plan of salvation in an ever clearer light and call our attention to it.
The books of the Old Testament describe the history of salvation, by
which the coming of Christ into the world was slowly prepared. The
earliest documents, as they are read in the Church and are
understood in the light of a further and full revelation, bring the
figure of a woman, Mother of the Redeemer, into a gradually clearer
light. Considered in this light, she is already prophetically fore -
shadowed in the promise of victory over the serpent which was given
to our first parents after their fall into sin. (cf Gen 3:15)” (LG 55)

4. MARY OUR MOTHER
But if we claim the inheritance of children, there must be
esteem for the motherhood through which it comes. A third
aspect of Legion devotion to Mary is the special honouring of
her as our real mother, which in very fact she is.
Mary became the Mother of Christ and our mother when
to the Angel’s salutation she pronounced her meek assent,
“Here am I, the servant of the Lord, let it be with me
according to your word.” (Lk 1:38) That motherhood of hers
was proclaimed at the moment when it reached its complete
expansion, that is, when Redemption was consummated.
Amid the sorrows of Calvary Jesus said to her from the cross:
“Woman, here is your son” and to St. John “Here is your
mother.” (Jn 19:26-27) Through St. John, these words were
addressed to all the elect. Fully co-operating by her consent
and sorrows in this spiritual birth of mankind, Mary became
in the fullest and most perfect sense our mother.
Truly her children, we must behave as such, and indeed as
very little children dependent utterly upon her. We must look
to her to feed us, to guide us, to teach us, to cure our
ailments, to console us in our griefs, to counsel us in our
doubts, to recall us when we wander, so that wholly confided
to her care, we may grow to the resemblance of our elder
brother, Jesus, and share his mission of combating sin and
conquering it.
“Mary is the Mother of the Church not only because she is the
Mother of Christ and his most intimate associate in ‘the new
economy when the Son of God took a human nature from her, that
he might in the mysteries of his flesh free man from sin’ but also
because ‘she shines forth to the whole community of the elect as a