FROM THE SERVANT GENERAL
ON MARY
(Part 26)
CO-REDEMPTRIX – 2
Memorial of the Blessed Virgin Mary,
Mother of the Church
June 6, 2022
Today’s reading: Genesis 3:9-15,20
Mary, the mother of Jesus, is our mother as well. Jesus himself gave her to us as our mother, through the apostle John, at the foot of the cross. Eve of course “was the mother of all the living” (v.20), our biological mother. But Mary, more importantly, is our spiritual mother. She is the New Eve. Where Eve, in disobedience to God, ate of the forbidden fruit and so lost paradise for us, Mary, in obedience to God, gave birth to Jesus and together won paradise back for us.
The evil one caused the loss of Eden, and has continuously attacked God’s people in order to bring them out of God’s embrace and into damnation. In this spiritual war, it is not just Satan against Jesus, but it is Satan against both Jesus and Mary. God said to the serpent: “I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your offspring and hers; they will strike at your head, while you strike at their heel.” (v.15). This is the promise of a Redeemer, who would be Jesus.
In this passage, we see that the primary conflict is between Satan and Mary, and then between their respective offspring. Satan knew that the Savior would be born of a woman. This is possibly why Lucifer (Satan) rebelled against God in the first place. Now in this prophetic word, at this very gloomy time when paradise is lost, there is hope. Indeed, Jesus would crush the head of the serpent, which he accomplished on the cross at Calvary. In the meantime, until the final crushing of the evil one, he and his minions would continue to strike.
So Jesus is the Redeemer, while Mary, together with Jesus, as part of God’s eternal and inscrutable plan, is his co-Redemptrix. It is they, both Jesus and Mary, who strike at the head of Satan. While Jesus is the one and only Redeemer, Mary, in her cooperation and assent to God’s grace and plan, is co-Redemptrix. “Co” means “with.” This does not take anything away from Jesus. It is akin to our now being used by God as instruments in order to continue with Jesus’ divine work. But it is most significant with regard to Mary, the very mother of Jesus, the one who brought the Savior into the world, the one who was intimately involved in the life of the Savior from start to finish.
It is however unfortunate that there are modernists in the Church who do not want to give Mary what is her due. There is a top hierarch who even says that requests for a new Marian dogma on Mary as co-Redemptrix are foolish and silly. Foolish and silly? Catholic tradition for centuries since the 14th century has considered Mary as co-Redemptrix. Tragically, these modernists are dismissing tradition and attacking the guardians of what they call “dead traditions.”
The Protestants constantly denigrate Mary, and see where they are now—corrupt and immoral, fully embracing the culture of DEATH. Modernist hierarchs in our Church want to go on the same path as Protestants have, and will not give Mary the fullness of the honor that is her due. But until we understand and align ourselves along God’s eternal plan, revealed even from the time of the fall in Eden, we will continue to be brought down by the strikes of the serpent.
Use the weapon that Mary has given us, the Rosary, and look to her as co-Redemptrix.
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