a year of prayer: 365 Rosaries

Saint Simon Stock, the feast we celebrate today, demonstrated great sanctity from a young age, reciting the Little Office of the Blessed Virgin Mary as early as age six. This beautiful prayer and reflection is one which is recited at eight separate times throughout the day, beginning in the morning after waking, and ending at night, prior to sleeping. It is a lengthy meditation on the grace and beauty of Our Blessed Mother, containing prayer, readings, reflections, intercessions, responses, and psalms.


During this month of May—Our Blessed Mother’s month—and on this, the feast of Saint Simon Stock, I thought a brief excerpt from the Little Office of the Blessed Virgin Mary was appropriate. Our Lady of Mount Carmel, pray for us! Intercede for us with Jesus, Our Lord!


Opening Prayer
Open thou my mouth, O lord to bless thy Holy Name,
cleanse my heart also from all vain, perverse, and distracting thoughts,
enlighten my understanding, inflame my affections,
that I may recite this Office of the Blessed Virgin Mary with worthy attention and devotion, and may deserve to be heard in the sight of Thy Divine Majesty, through Christ, Our Lord. Amen.


O Lord, I offer these hours unto thee, in union with that divine intention wherewith thou didst thyself offer praises to God, whilst thou was on earth.



The Word took our nature from Mary
From a letter by Saint Athanasius, bishop


What was born of Mary was therefore human by nature, in accordance with the inspired Scriptures, and the body of the Lord was a true body: It was a true body because it was the same as ours. Mary, you see, is our sister, for we are all born from Adam.


The words of St John, the Word was made flesh, bear the same meaning, as we may see from a similar turn of phrase in St Paul: Christ was made a curse for our sake. Mary's body has acquired something great through its communion and union with the Word. From being mortal it has been made immortal; though it was a living body it has become a spiritual one; though it was made from the earth it has passed through the gates of heaven.


Even when the Word takes a body from Mary, the Trinity remains a Trinity, with neither increase nor decrease. It is for ever perfect. In the Trinity we acknowledge one Godhead, and thus one God, the Father of the Word, is proclaimed in the Church.




Mary our mother
From a sermon by Saint Aelred, abbot

She is our mother — the mother of our life, the mother of our incarnation, the mother of our light. As the apostle says of our Lord: He became for us by God's power our wisdom and justice, and holiness and redemption.


She then, as mother of Christ, is the mother of our wisdom and justice, of our holiness and redemption. She is more our mother than the mother of our flesh. Our birth from her is better, for from her is born our holiness, our wisdom, our justice, our sanctification, our redemption


Praise the Lord in his holy ones, say the Scriptures. If our Lord is to be praised in those holy ones through whom he brings to being deeds of power and miracles, how much more is he to be praised in her in whom he fashioned himself, who is wonderful beyond all wonders.


Mary as type of the Church
From the dogmatic constitution on the Church of the Second Vatican Council


Mary, because she has entered intimately into the history of salvation, in a certain sense gathers up in her own person the great truths of the faith and awakens their resonance when she is the object of preaching and veneration; she summons the faithful to her Son, to his sacrifice and to the Father’s love. In seeking to further the glory of Christ, the Church becomes more and more like Mary, its exalted type, as it continues its progress in faith, hope and charity, seeking and fulfilling the divine will in all things.


So also in its apostolic task the Church rightly looks to the one who bore Christ, Christ who was conceived by the Holy Spirit and born of the Virgin in order that he might also be born and grow in the hearts of the faithful. In her whole life this virgin mother showed herself as an example of that motherly love that must animate all who share in the apostolic mission of the Church for the regeneration of mankind.

 Concluding Prayer
God our Father,
may we always profit by the prayers of the Virgin Mother Mary, for You bring us life and salvation through Jesus Christ her Son Who lives and reigns with You and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen.