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Chapter 57Ansl.1.57

ORATIO LVIII [ol. LVII]. AD SANCTAM VIRGINEM MARIAM. In Partu ejus.

Praise of the Virgin Mother

The soul blesses Mary for bearing the Lord as a perpetual virgin and for undoing the pain of Eve's curse through Christ's birth.

Most holy Virgin, give me strength through the merits of your most holy virginal birth against your enemies. Blessed are you, Mary, for you carried the Lord of all, the Creator of the ages. You gave birth to the One who made you, and you remain a Virgin forever. Blessed is the womb that carried the Son of the eternal Father.✦ Blessed are your breasts, which nursed Christ the Lord.✦ Blessed and venerable you are, Virgin Mary, full of the beatitude of all good things. Blessed mother, who alone gave birth without pain, because you alone gave birth as a Virgin. Blessed and most blessed among women, for Christ our God, born from you a Virgin, by his most holy birth — undoing the curse of the first parent and of the first woman giving birth in penal pain — gave through you, without pain, one giving birth; with the old guilt forgiven, he granted the honey-flowing blessing of new grace and eternal salvation.✦✦12

Cry for Mercy

The prayer turns inward, asking Mary's mercy while confessing the speaker's sinful conception and life.

Through the joys of your most holy virgin birth, have mercy on me, my lady, and hear my prayer. For behold, I was conceived in iniquities, and in sins my mother conceived me.✦3

Prayer for Renewal Through the Nativity

The speaker confesses a life of sin, contrasts it with Mary's purity, and asks that Christ's Nativity bring spiritual renewal and joy.

I was born in sin, and in sin I have lived my whole life long.✦ But you, my Lady, were found to be the mother of the Savior without any touch of shame.4 Have mercy on me, unclean as I am, conceived and raised in sin; and help me with your holy prayers, most serene Virgin: that just as the birth of your Son, our Lord Jesus Christ, was a dreadful ruin of sorrow for the world, yet a birth of new exultation for all the faithful — so too may these same joys of the Lord's Nativity be for me the beginning of a devout life and wholesome self-restraint, the downfall of all unjust grief and wicked sadness, and the birth of spiritual joy and exultation, of love and longing for the heavenly homeland and its supernal gladness.✦567 Holy mother of God, come to my aid and intercede with your beloved Son on behalf of me, a sinner. Amen.

Read the original Latin

Virgo sanctissima, da mihi virtutem per merita tui sanctissimi virginei partus, contra hostes tuos. Benedicta es enim Maria, quae Dominum omnium portasti Creatorem saeculorum. Genuisti qui te fecit, et in aeternum permanes Virgo. Beata viscera, quae portaverunt aeterni Patris Filium. Beata ubera tua, quae lactaverunt Christum Dominum. Beata et venerabilis es, Virgo Maria, omnium bonorum beatitudine plena. Beata mater, quae sola sine dolore genuisti, quia tu sola peperisti Virgo. Beata et benedicta inter mulieres; quia natus ex te Virgine Christus Deus noster, sua sanctissima nativitate primi parentis, et primae mulieris in dolore poenaliter parturientis solvendo maledictionem, dedit per te sine dolore parturientem, dimissa veteri culpa, novae gratiae et salutis aeternae mellifluam benedictionem.

Per gaudia tui sanctissimi virginei partus miserere mei, domina mea, et exaudi orationem meam. Ecce enim in iniquitatibus conceptus sum, et in peccatis concepit me mater mea.

In peccatis sum natus, et in peccatis conversatus sum per omne tempus vitae meae. Tu autem, domina mea, sine tactu pudoris inventa es mater Salvatoris. Miserere mihi immundo, qui in peccatis conceptus et nutritus sum; et adjuva me tuis sanctis precibus, Virgo serenissima: ut sicut nativitas filii tui Domini nostri Jesu Christi ruina fuit horribilis tristitiae, nativitas universis fidelibus novae exsultationis; ita et mihi haec eadem gaudia Dominicae Nativitatis sint initium vitae religiosae et salutaris continentiae, et ruina totius injusti moeroris et iniquae tristitiae, et nativitas spiritualis gaudii et exsultationis, et amor et desiderium coelestis patriae et supernae laetitiae. Sancta Dei genitrix, succurre et intercede apud dulcem tuum natum pro me peccatore. Amen.

Scripture echoes

  1. ↩Luke.11.27 — And it came about that while he was saying these things, a certain woman from the crowd lifted up her voice and said to him, "Blessed is the womb that bore you and the breasts that you nursed."
  2. ↩Luke.11.27 — And it came about that while he was saying these things, a certain woman from the crowd lifted up her voice and said to him, "Blessed is the womb that bore you and the breasts that you nursed."
  3. ↩Gen.3.16 — To the woman he said, "I will greatly multiply your pain and your conception; in pain you shall bring forth children, and your desire shall be for your husband, and he shall rule over you."
  4. ↩Luke.1.28 — And coming to her, he said, 'Greetings, favored one! The Lord is with you.'
  5. ↩Ps.50.7;Ps.52.5 — Hear, O my people, and I will speak; O Israel, I will testify against you. I am God, your God. Ps.52.5 — You love evil more than good, lying more than speaking what is right. Selah.
  6. ↩Ps.51.5 — For I know my transgressions, and my sin is ever before me.
  7. ↩Ps.51.5 — For I know my transgressions, and my sin is ever before me.

Notes

  1. 1 ↩The syntax of 'primi parentis, et primae mulieris in dolore poenaliter parturientis solvendo maledictionem' is compressed: the ablative absolute 'solvendo maledictionem' is taken with the birth of Christ undoing the Genesis 3:16 curse on the woman in childbirth. The participial phrase 'parturientis' agrees with 'primae mulieris' (Eve), while 'primi parentis' (Adam) is a genitive dependent on the whole construction.
  2. 2 ↩'mellifluam benedictionem' rendered as 'honey-flowing blessing' to preserve the traditional devotional image of sweetness flowing from Mary's role in salvation; alternatives like 'richly flowing' would lose the established metaphor.
  3. 3 ↩Direct quotation of Psalm 50:7 (Vulgate) / Psalm 51:5 (Hebrew). The speaker places himself in the voice of the psalmist confessing original sin.
  4. 4 ↩sine tactu pudoris — 'without any touch of shame' — emphasizes Mary's purity and freedom from the shame of sin in her role as mother of the Savior. The phrase underscores the contrast with the speaker's own sinfulness.
  5. 5 ↩The sicut…ita construction sets up an extended analogy: Christ's Nativity brought ruin to sorrow and new joy to the faithful; the speaker asks that the same feast bring spiritual renewal to his own life. The parallel structure is preserved in translation.
  6. 6 ↩ruina rendered as 'ruin' and 'downfall' — the word carries a deliberate paradox: Christ's birth is the 'ruin' of sorrow and sin, i.e., their destruction. This positive use of ruin/downfall is theologically intentional.
  7. 7 ↩nativitas used both for Christ's birth and for the speaker's spiritual renewal — the word bridges the historical Nativity and the interior 'birth' of new life in the soul.

Orationes sive Meditationes — Collection for Princess Adeliza of Normandy companion

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