Today's Feast (December 8): Conception of the BVM

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This being the season of Advent, it is most appropriate that the Church sets aside a day to celebrate the birth of the Blessed Virgin Mary - highly blessed because of her willingness to bear the Christ child, the Son of God.

This feast day has been celebrated in the East since the 8th century and in the West since the 9th century. Although the Roman Catholic Church holds that Mary was born without sin, Orthodox belief, both East and West, does not embrace this doctrine.

The universal Church, however, most assuredly deems her to be both holy and good, as God selected her among all women to give birth to the Incarnate Word.

"Hail thou that are highly favoured: the Lord is with thee: blessed art thou among women" (St. Luke 1:28). (The day's gospel, page E 11, The People's Anglican Missal)

The Day's Propers
Catholic Encyclopedia article

Books Worth Considering
Their Blood Cries Out
Fox's Book of Martyrs
Reason Is Beguiled: On the Mystery of Martyrdom and of Total Self Gift
By Their Blood: Christian Martyrs of the Twentieth Century
The Treasury of Saints and Martyrs
The Concise Oxford Dictionary of the Christian Church
Oxford Dictionary of the Christian Church
The Concise Oxford Dictionary of the Christian Church
The Oxford Dictionary of Saints (Oxford Paperback Reference)
The Penguin Dictionary of Saints: Third Edition (Dictionary, Penguin)

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