Union between Holy Spirit and Mary

[MariaChristi]

Dear Brothers and Sisters,

In the book entitled Immaculate Conception and the Holy Spirit (subtitled, The Marian Teachings of St. Maximilian Kolbe) I found what St. JPII’s words reminded me of in paragraph 29, Chapter 8 of “Mulieris Dignitatem”, when St. John Paul II wrote:

In God’s eternal plan, woman is the one in whom the order of love in the created world of persons takes first root. The order of love belongs to the intimate life of God himself, the life of the Trinity. In the intimate life of God, the Holy Spirit is the personal hypostasis of love. Through the Spirit, Uncreated Gift, love becomes a gift for created persons. Love, which is of God, communicates itself to creatures: “God’s love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who has been given to us” (Rom 5:5).

The word “hypostasis” is a Greek word, and I immediatley remembered the words “Hypostatic Union” used to explain the union of the Divine and Human natures in the One Person of God the Son. I also remembered something from the works of St. Maximilian Kolbe describing the unique union of Mary in her humanity with the Divine Person of the Holy Spirit. One would need to read the entire book, to get the fullness of St. Maximilian’s theological thought, but Fr. H.M. Manteau-Bonamy, O.P. writes this on p. 60

Whereas the union between the human and the divine was immediately perfect in Christ, the Incarnate Word, the union between the Most Blessed Virgin Mary and the Holy Spirit grew progressively closer. It was already a reality the moment the privileged creature came into being; it consecrated her in the Annunciation, as the Mother of God. This union became perfect in the person of the Immaculata when she was assumed into the glory of heaven…

From an article written by Kolbe in 1938 (included toward the end of the same book):

…just as the Second Person of God appears in the flesh bearing the name “seed of the woman”, so also the Holy Spirit reveals His share in the work of redemption through the Immaculate Virgin whom he has conjoined with himself most profoundly in a manner surpassing all our power to understand but preserving into the Person hood of each of them. Their union therefore is different from the hypostatic union that unites the two natures, divine and human, in one sole Person of Christ; nevertheless, this difference in no way prevents Mary from being the most perfect action of the Holy Spirit…(pp 168-169)

We are coming close to the end of “Mulieris Dignitatem” but hopefully we will continue to ponder this Meditation on Mary as “Icon of the Church” Her union with the Holy Spirit is important for us to ponder, as the Church continues to depend on the Holy Spirit to bring us into All Truth.

 

[Vivat_Christus]

Great post, MariaChristi. Reminds of something St. Louis de Montfort said in “True Devotion to Mary”:

*17. God the Father imparted to Mary his fruitfulness as far as a mere creature was capable of receiving it, to enable her to bring forth his Son and all the members of his mystical body.

1. God the Son came into her virginal womb as a new Adam into his earthly paradise, to take his delight there and produce hidden wonders of grace…
2. God the Holy Spirit, who does not produce any divine person, became fruitful through Mary whom he espoused. It was with her, in her and of her that he produced his masterpiece, God-made-man, and that he produces every day until the end of the world the members of the body of this adorable Head. For this reason the more he finds Mary his dear and inseparable spouse in a soul the more powerful and effective he becomes in producing Jesus Christ in that soul and that soul in Jesus Christ.
3. This does not mean that the Blessed Virgin confers on the Holy Spirit a fruitfulness which he does not already possess. Being God, he has the ability to produce just like the Father and the Son, although he does not use this power and so does not produce another divine person. But it does mean that the Holy Spirit chose to make use of our Blessed Lady, although he had no absolute need of her, in order to become actively fruitful in producing Jesus Christ and his members in her and by her. This is a mystery of grace unknown even to many of the most learned and spiritual of Christians.*

 

[MariaChristi]

Great post, MariaChristi. Reminds of something St. Louis de Montfort said in “True Devotion to Mary”:

*17. God the Father imparted to Mary his fruitfulness as far as a mere creature was capable of receiving it, to enable her to bring forth his Son and all the members of his mystical body.

1. God the Son came into her virginal womb as a new Adam into his earthly paradise, to take his delight there and produce hidden wonders of grace…
2. God the Holy Spirit, who does not produce any divine person, became fruitful through Mary whom he espoused. It was with her, in her and of her that he produced his masterpiece, God-made-man, and that he produces every day until the end of the world the members of the body of this adorable Head. For this reason the more he finds Mary his dear and inseparable spouse in a soul the more powerful and effective he becomes in producing Jesus Christ in that soul and that soul in Jesus Christ.
3. This does not mean that the Blessed Virgin confers on the Holy Spirit a fruitfulness which he does not already possess. Being God, he has the ability to produce just like the Father and the Son, although he does not use this power and so does not produce another divine person. But it does mean that the Holy Spirit chose to make use of our Blessed Lady, although he had no absolute need of her, in order to become actively fruitful in producing Jesus Christ and his members in her and by her. This is a mystery of grace unknown even to many of the most learned and spiritual of Christians.*

Thanks, so much, for your reply! Yes, I believe St. Louis de Montfort is the “gold standard” regarding devotion to Mary. You probably read, as I did, that Saint John Paul II prayed de Montfort’s Act of Total Consecration to Jesus through Mary daily. St. JPII also wrote that reading De Montfort’s treatise, True Devotion to the Blessed Virgin Mary as a young man, was a turning point in his life.