Glorification of Mother of God – Dec 26 I Daiva Mathavinte Pukazachha (Nusrotho/Kuloso)

Christ is born! Glorify Him!
Oh, noble Mother of God, who contained God, on the day of your remembrance, we join with God!
Thanks to the Holy Spirit, Who dwell in you. O Holy Trinity show kindness to our souls!

The Holy Church has separated Dec 26, on the next day of Christ’s Nativity, as the feast day for the glorification of St. Mary, Mother of God. The Church glorifies the Mother of God, to draw our attention to Christ’s Holy Mother and to give us an opportunity to give praise, glorify and thanksgiving to the Most-holy Theotokos, who gave birth to our Lord, God and Saviour Jesus Christ, her Divine Son. This day is called the Synaxis (meeting or coming together to glorify) of the Holy Theotokos.

Unfortunately, as this day comes immediately after celebrations of Christmas, this day does not the due attention and devotion of the faithful. Blessed Virgin Mary is revered on a separate day with the Feast of Glorification. The entire Church is to unite in its joy over the new-born Saviour of the world with fervent glorification of the Mother of God.

The Church has always glorified the most holy Mother of God as the Protectress and Defender of the Christian people, entreating, by her intercession, God’s loving-kindness towards us sinners.  St. Mary has been recognized as the Chief of all the saints and Queen of Heaven. She is the intercessor for all mankind. Both in heaven and on earth, all the angels, all the saints, and all mankind glorify the Mother of God, who is more honorable than the cherubim and beyond compare more glorious than the seraphim, because through her came the Creator of the world – our Saviour, the Lord Jesus Christ. We honor, glorigy, magnify and revere the Theotokos, the mother of the True Light.

So, let us gather, in our thoughtful Synaxis, around the manger of the Saviour to worship Him and to honour His Holy Mother. She bore Him, Who carries the mountain and the seas. Mother Mary is blessed, as she decorated the ship where the Lord, our Captain resided. (Akhila jagalpathiye naayaka Naayeeti goshichangathi bahumaanichu Mariam). Her womb was His mansion; her womb was His Throne. Mother Mary is blessed, as she gave us the Living Son of God. She contained and created, the Creator of the sky, with purity of virginity. She said, ‘every generation will call me blessed’. More so, she was bold enough to say Who is residing in her. It was this event that gave her blessings.

In praising and glorifying the Most Holy Theotokos, the Church points to Mary as the one through whom the Incarnation was made possible. His humanity – concretely and historically – is the humanity He received from Mary. His body is, first of all, her body. His life is her life. Just as she attains her majesty through humility, so she attains her mother-hood through virginity. She retains virginity and becomes a mother, uniting two mysteries of life that never exist simultaneously.

This feast, the assembly in honor of the Theotokos, is probably the most ancient feast of Mary in the Christian tradition, the very beginning of her veneration by the Church. The Holy Church is honoring St. Mary, Mother of God for all her tasks which were essential for the execution of God’s master plan of salvation. Let the continued intercession of St. Mary, Mother of God be a fort of protection for all of us and for the Holy Church.