The answer
We beatify St. Mary for all these things: for being the mother of our Lord, for her virginity and faith, and for her holy life. We beatify her for all these things together, but especially because she was the mother of God. For she was singled out from among all the women in the world for this purpose.
We can say to her the words of the proverb: "Many daughters have done well, But you excel them all. " (Prov. 31:29)
In fact St. Elizabeth said to Virgin Mary: "Blessed is she who believed, for there will be a fulfillment of those things which were told her from the Lord."(Luke 1:45) And what Mary believed would be accomplished was that she would become the Mother of God. Elizabeth did not restrict Mary's beatification just to her having this faith, but had previously said: " But why is this granted to me, that the mother of my Lord should come to me?" (Luke 1:43). And in praising St. Mary she added: "Blessed are you among women, and blessed is the child you will bear!" (Luke 1:43)
All these things focus on St Mary being the Mother of God, and we cannot just take one phrase of Elizabeth's glorification of St Mary and leave out all the other references which go to provide a complete picture.
I would like to say that St Mary being a virgin and the Mother of God were two qualities which she possessed which were connected with the subject of salvation itself.
Salvation could not have come about without the incarnation and the incarnation meant that the Lord was born of a woman, from a human being, with the same nature that we possess, and by this it became possible for Him to act on our behalf. This is why the Lord Jesus Christ insisted on calling Himself the 'Son of Man', because it was in this capacity that He redeemed mankind. The only way that He could become a son of Man was through being born of St Mary.
Thus St Mary's special title of 'Mother of God' is a title that is connected with the redemption or the salvation, because this would not have come about if it hadn't been for the incarnation.
Does St Mary's virginity also have a connection with the subject of salvation?
Yes, of course, because Christ could not have been born as a result of normal human seed of man and woman, for this would have made Him an ordinary human being!
He had to be born of a virgin by some unusual method, through the Holy Spirit. He already had a Father, who was God, and thus He was not born in the state of original sin. And because He was holy, He was able to ransom sinners.
Why then should we not beatify the Virgin Mary for being a Virgin and the Mother of God when these two attributes were so necessary for our salvation?
In any case, would a person, whatever his Christian denomination, gain anything from not beatifying the Virgin Mary for being a virgin and the Mother of God? St. Paul praised virginity and said that it was a preferable state to marriage if the individual could manage it. (See 1 Cor. 7)
Therefore, when St. Mary said: "From now on all generations will call me blessed" she did not mean that her faith would be the cause of her beatification, but that it was
because, " For He who is mighty has done great things for me, and holy is His name. " (Luke 1:48-49)
Naturally this glorification was the ability to give birth, even though she was a virgin, to bear the Lord Himself. What glory could be greater than this?
Any woman can have faith. But it is not every woman who can bear a child whilst still a virgin and bear the child who was to be the Lord Himself!
So if the beatification of St Mary is confined to her faith alone, it would be to make her like other devout women, without being different from them at all, which is the familiar Protestant standpoint.
As far as God's not attaching particular spiritual importance to family relationships of physical kinship is concerned, that is not technically correct from what the Bible teaches.
Sufficient proof of this is that God put honouring one's parents as the top priority regarding the commandments pertaining to relationships between people. (Deut. 5:16)
St. Paul also stressed this commandment to honour your father and mother," which is the first commandment with promise:" (Eph. 6:2)
In the Old Testament, death was the penalty for cursing one's father or mother (Matt. 15:4), and in the New Testament, it
says: " if anyone does not provide for his own, and especially for those of his household, he has denied the faith and is worse than an unbeliever " (1 Tim. 5:8). And the Lord Jesus Christ rebuked the Scribes and the Pharisees for not teaching the need to respect one's parents, on the pretext that anything that they might have given to their parents they were giving to God instead. (Matt. 15:5)
Something which perhaps gives a good indication of Christ's concern for His mother is that He singled her out when He was on the cross, with two out of the seven phrases that He said, and put her in the care of His beloved disciple. (John 19:26-27)
There are countless examples of the Lord's concern for family relationships.
To say that God attaches little spiritual importance to natural family bonds and ties of kinship would be to demolish the family and with it, the basis of society, which is something that would not agree with the teaching of the Bible, either in the Old Testament or the New. If someone does not respect his mother and father, he would be hardly likely to show respect for anyone else! They would be a disobedient and disrespectful son or daughter. Under the law of Moses the person would have been stoned and according to the New Testament he would not be regarded as a believer.
Finally, Christ honoured Virgin Mary as a mother and as a spiritual human being when He chose her for being the most holy woman of all, to be a Mother to Him (((
[ 52 ]
Thrice-Blessed Pope Shenouda III of Blessed Memory