The Hail Mary and penance

[dal11]

Your thinking is a little messed up. I don’t mean that in a bad way. We don’t pray to proportions. Oops I prayed to three saints today so now I got to make sure I paray to Jesus at least four times. Prayer to saints is prayer to Jesus. Let’s say you were sick and one by one you ask everyone in church to pray for you as the came in the door. Let’s say 200 people came to church that day. Does that mean you now have to pray to Jesus 201 times to make the proportions more then even. When you ask them individuals to pray for you that’s exactly what we do with saints. We are all in communion with the saints. Just an example I wanted to share.

 

[hurst]

levi86:

This is exactly what I was concerned about, three Hail Marys to one Our Father. I’m fine with some Hail Marys but in the right proportions.

The Hail Mary is more a prayer of gratitude on behalf of Mary than it is one of direct praise to her. After all, the words “Hail, Mary, full of grace” are not our words, but those of God the Father spoken through His angel messenger. So in saying those words, we recall them. Sort of like saying to Mary, “Remember when God said this to you through His angel?” It fills her with such gratitude, and we can turn to God and offer her gratitude to Him. We can add our own gratitude: “Thank you God for this announcement to Mary whereby you fulfilled your promise of a redeemer from the time of Adam and Eve!”. So it is doubly a prayer of gratitude. But there is more! The angel was privileged to hail the Blessed Virgin, and we can recall the event with Archangel Gabriel as well! “Remember the time you were privileged to bear this great news to Mary?”.

The same can be done with the second part, whereby Elizabeth says “Blessed is the fruit of thy womb!”. For she was filled with the Holy Spirit, meaning that the Holy Spirit said this to Mary! So we can recall this to Mary, inspiring gratitude from her which we can offer to God the Holy Spirit. And likewise thank the Holy Spirit. And we can rejoice with Elizabeth as well, recalling the happy moment with her. Etc.

So you see, a Hail Mary is very rich in gratitude, and one could spend five minutes on each one.

Can you see now how appropriate a Hail Mary is after receiving absolution? Nor is it excluding God at all. He is greatly honored and glorified thereby, especially if we contribute with our minds and hearts.

hurst