{"id":2763,"date":"2020-05-16T09:53:44","date_gmt":"2020-05-16T08:53:44","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/stthomasneilston.co.uk\/?p=2763"},"modified":"2020-05-16T09:53:44","modified_gmt":"2020-05-16T08:53:44","slug":"saturday-and-the-blessed-virgin-mary","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.stthomasneilston.co.uk\/?p=2763","title":{"rendered":"Saturday and the Blessed Virgin Mary"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><span class=\"s3\"><span class=\"bumpedFont15\">Saturday is traditionally the day in which we honour the Blessed Virgin Mary.\u00a0<\/span><\/span><!--more--><\/p>\n<p><span class=\"s3\"><span class=\"bumpedFont15\"><br \/>\n<\/span><\/span><span class=\"s3\"><span class=\"bumpedFont15\">On most Saturdays of the year priests can offer a votive Mass in her honour and<\/span><\/span><span class=\"s3\"><span class=\"bumpedFont15\"> recite<\/span><\/span><span class=\"s3\"><span class=\"bumpedFont15\">the <\/span><\/span><span class=\"s3\"><span class=\"bumpedFont15\">Common of the Blessed Virgin Mary (Liturgy of the hours) when there is no Memorial or Feast day.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span class=\"s3\"><span class=\"bumpedFont15\">This Tradition goes back to the Middle Ages<\/span><\/span><span class=\"s3\"><span class=\"bumpedFont15\">.<\/span><\/span><span class=\"s3\"><span class=\"bumpedFont15\"> \u00a0St Thomas Aquinas remarks that since the Resurrection was on a Sunday and became our Sabbath, our day of rest, our holy day, the day before, Saturday, <\/span><\/span><span class=\"s3\"><span class=\"bumpedFont15\">Mary<\/span><\/span><span class=\"s3\"><span class=\"bumpedFont15\">remained steadfast and unshaken in her faith<\/span><\/span><span class=\"s3\"><span class=\"bumpedFont15\">, she did not waver<\/span><\/span><span class=\"s3\"><span class=\"bumpedFont15\"> despite her grief and pain<\/span><\/span><span class=\"s3\"><span class=\"bumpedFont15\">. He is suggesting that this could be a reason that we honour Her on a Saturday.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span class=\"s3\"><span class=\"bumpedFont15\">On Fridays we contemplate and meditate on Jesus\u2019s death, passion and suffering and on Saturdays we could also reflect on Our Lady\u2019s sorrows. She too accepted the bitter chalice of suffering. She did not like Jesus suffer in body but like him she suffered in her soul. She suffered by accepting the sacrifice of her dear son\u2019s life and this caused immense grief and <\/span><\/span><span class=\"s3\"><span class=\"bumpedFont15\">intense <\/span><\/span><span class=\"s3\"><span class=\"bumpedFont15\">pain. <\/span><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span class=\"s3\"><span class=\"bumpedFont15\">Mary<\/span><\/span><span class=\"s3\"><span class=\"bumpedFont15\"> unites <\/span><\/span><span class=\"s3\"><span class=\"bumpedFont15\">herself <\/span><\/span><span class=\"s3\"><span class=\"bumpedFont15\">especially to those who suffer <\/span><\/span><span class=\"s3\"><span class=\"bumpedFont15\">because of their own experiences of anguish and heartache that involve their children. <\/span><\/span><span class=\"s3\"><span class=\"bumpedFont15\">Mary<\/span><\/span><span class=\"s3\"><span class=\"bumpedFont15\"> is never remote from us and invites us to draw some strength from her<\/span><\/span><span class=\"s3\"><span class=\"bumpedFont15\">,<\/span><\/span><span class=\"s3\"><span class=\"bumpedFont15\"> in our own valley of tears.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p><strong><span class=\"s4\"><span class=\"bumpedFont15\">Prayer of St Bridget of Sweden<\/span><\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n<p><span class=\"s3\"><span class=\"bumpedFont15\">\u201c<\/span><\/span><span class=\"s3\"><span class=\"bumpedFont15\">O Blessed Virgin Mary, Immaculate Mother of God, who didst endure a martyrdom of love and grief, beholding the sufferings and sorrows of Jesus<\/span><\/span><span class=\"s3\"><span class=\"bumpedFont15\">.<\/span><\/span><span class=\"s3\"><span class=\"bumpedFont15\"> Thou didst co-operate in the benefit of my redemption by thy innumerable afflictions and by offering to the Eternal Father His only-begotten Son as a holocaust and victim of propitiation for my sins. I thank thee for the unspeakable love which led thee to deprive thyself of the Fruit of thy womb, Jesus, true God and true Man, to save me, a sinner. Oh<\/span><\/span><span class=\"s3\"><span class=\"bumpedFont15\">,<\/span><\/span><span class=\"s3\"><span class=\"bumpedFont15\"> make use of the unfailing intercession of thy sorrows with the Father and the Son, that I may steadfastly amend my life and never again crucify my loving Redeemer by new sins<\/span><\/span><span class=\"s3\"><span class=\"bumpedFont15\">,<\/span><\/span><span class=\"s3\"><span class=\"bumpedFont15\"> arid that, persevering till death in His grace, I may obtain eternal life through the merits of His Cross and Passion<\/span><\/span><span class=\"s3\"><span class=\"bumpedFont15\">\u201d. Amen.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Saturday is traditionally the day in which we honour the Blessed Virgin Mary.\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["entry","post","publish","author-ryan-black","has-more-link","post-2763","format-standard","category-uncategorized"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p85OtW-Iz","jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.stthomasneilston.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2763","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.stthomasneilston.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.stthomasneilston.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.stthomasneilston.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.stthomasneilston.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2763"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.stthomasneilston.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2763\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2764,"href":"https:\/\/www.stthomasneilston.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2763\/revisions\/2764"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.stthomasneilston.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2763"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.stthomasneilston.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2763"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.stthomasneilston.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2763"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}