Icon of the Birth of the Vigin Mary - The Blessed Mother
History:
The Feast of the Nativity of the Blessed Virgin Mary was celebrated at least by the sixth century, when St. Romanos the Melodist, an Eastern Christian who composed many of the hymns used in the Eastern Catholic and Eastern Orthodox liturgies, composed a hymn for the feast. The feast spread to Rome in the seventh century, but it was a couple more centuries before it was celebrated throughout the West. The source for the story of the birth of the Blessed Virgin Mary is the Protoevangelium of James, an apocryphal gospel written about A.D. 150. From it, we learn the names of Mary's parents, Joachim and Anna, as well as the tradition that the couple was childless until an angel appeared to Anna and told her that she would conceive. (Many of the same details appear also in the later apocryphal Gospel of the Nativity of Mary.)
The September 8 date helped determine the date for the feast of the Immaculate Conception on December 8 (nine months earlier).
SEDRO from the Maronite Prayer of the Faithful – Safro
Mary, the spirit finds itself powerless to describe your humility and the dignity to which you were raised.
The angle came to salute you in the name of the Most High, and in all humility you responded to him:
I am the handmaid of the Lord; let it be done to me according to your will. Because of your humility and your dignity, all generations call you blessed. The all-powerful has crowned you Queen of heaven and earth, Queen of angels and men.
Scripture Reading
A Reading from the Book of Sirach
Before all ages, in the beginning, he created me, and through all ages I shall not cease to be. In the holy tent I ministered before him, and in Zion I fixed my abode. Thus in the chosen city he has given me rest in Jerusalem in my domain. I have struck root among the glorious people, in the portion of the Lord, his heritage. “Like a cedar in Lebanon I am raised aloft, like a cypress on Mount Hermon, like a palm tree in Engedi, like a rosebush in Jericho.”
I spread out my branches like terebinth, my branches so bright and so graceful. I bud forth delights like the vine; my blossoms become fruit fair and rich. Come to me, all you that yearn for me and be filled with my fruits, you will remember me as sweeter than honey, better to have than the honeycomb. He who eats of me will hunger still, he who drinks of me will thirst for more, he who obeys me will not be put to shame, and he who serves me will never fail. All of this is true of the book of the Most High’s covenant, the law that Moses commanded us as in inheritance for the community of Jacob.
The September 8 date helped determine the date for the feast of the Immaculate Conception on December 8 (nine months earlier).
SEDRO from the Maronite Prayer of the Faithful – Safro
Mary, the spirit finds itself powerless to describe your humility and the dignity to which you were raised.
The angle came to salute you in the name of the Most High, and in all humility you responded to him:
I am the handmaid of the Lord; let it be done to me according to your will. Because of your humility and your dignity, all generations call you blessed. The all-powerful has crowned you Queen of heaven and earth, Queen of angels and men.
Scripture Reading
A Reading from the Book of Sirach
Before all ages, in the beginning, he created me, and through all ages I shall not cease to be. In the holy tent I ministered before him, and in Zion I fixed my abode. Thus in the chosen city he has given me rest in Jerusalem in my domain. I have struck root among the glorious people, in the portion of the Lord, his heritage. “Like a cedar in Lebanon I am raised aloft, like a cypress on Mount Hermon, like a palm tree in Engedi, like a rosebush in Jericho.”
I spread out my branches like terebinth, my branches so bright and so graceful. I bud forth delights like the vine; my blossoms become fruit fair and rich. Come to me, all you that yearn for me and be filled with my fruits, you will remember me as sweeter than honey, better to have than the honeycomb. He who eats of me will hunger still, he who drinks of me will thirst for more, he who obeys me will not be put to shame, and he who serves me will never fail. All of this is true of the book of the Most High’s covenant, the law that Moses commanded us as in inheritance for the community of Jacob.
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