Maria who?

[seeker63]

I was reading about Spanish dictator Francisco Franco. All of his grand-daughters had traditional Catholic names—Maria de la this and that. I’d heard of all the variations and knew what they meant except for one—“Maria de la O.” I’ve since seen this name elsewhere in another context. Now I know about Maria de la Dolores, Lourdes, Carmen, Pilar, and so forth, but what’s the story on “de la O”?

 

[The_Hidden_Life]

Here you go, from the New Advent encyclopedia:

*The feast of 18 December was commonly called, even in the liturgical books, “S. Maria de la O”, because on that day the clerics in the choir after Vespers used to utter a loud and protracted “O”, to express the longing of the universe for the coming of the Redeemer (Tamayo, Mart. Hisp., VI, 485). The Roman “O” antiphons have nothing to do with this term, because they are unknown in the Mozarabic Rite. This feast and its octave were very popular in Spain, where the people still call it “Nuestra Señora de la O”. *

 

[seeker63]

Many thanks. There’s just no end of things to learn in this Church, which is something I love about it.