Mary is the Virgin Mother of God
H.H. Pope John Paul II
General Audience
September 13, 1995
1. In the Constitution Lumen gentium, the Council
states that "joined to Christ the head and in communion with
all his saints, the faithful must in the first place
reverence the memory 'of the glorious ever Virgin Mary,
Mother of our God and Lord Jesus Christ'" (n. 52). The
conciliar Constitution uses these terms from the Roman Canon
of the Mass, thereby stressing how faith in the divine
motherhood of Mary has been present in Christian thought
since the first centuries.
In the newborn Church Mary is remembered with the title
"Mother of Jesus". It is Luke himself who gives her this
title in the Acts of the Apostles, a title that
corresponds moreover to what is said in the Gospels: "Is
this not ... the son of Mary?", the residents of Nazareth
wonder according to the Evangelist Mark's account (6:3);
"Isn't Mary known to be his mother?", is the question
recorded by Matthew (13:55).
The motherhood of Mary also concerns the Church
2. In the disciples' eyes, as they gathered after the
Ascension, the title "Mother of Jesus" acquires its full
meaning. For them, Mary is a person unique in her kind: she
received the singular grace of giving birth to the Saviour
of humanity; she lived for a long while at his side; and on
Calvary she was called by the Crucified One to exercise a
"new motherhood" in relation to the beloved disciple and,
through him, to the whole Church.
For these who believe in Jesus and follow him, "Mother of
Jesus" is a title of honour and veneration, and will forever
remain such in the faith and life of the Church. In a
particular way, by this title Christians mean to say that
one cannot refer to Jesus' origins without acknowledging the
role of the woman who gave him birth in the Spirit according
to his human nature. Her maternal role also involves the
birth and growth of the Church. In recalling the place of
Mary in Jesus' life, the faithful discover each day her
efficacious presence in their own spiritual journey.
3. From the beginning, the Church has acknowledged the
virginal motherhood of Mary. As the infancy Gospels enable
us to grasp, the first Christian continuities themselves
gathered together Mary's recollections about the mysterious
circumstances of the Saviour's conception and birth. In
particular, the Annunciation account responds to the
disciples' desire to have the deepest knowledge of the
events connected with the beginnings of the risen Christ's
earthly life. In the last analysis, Mary is at the origin of
the revelation about the mystery of the virginal conception
by the work of the Holy Spirit.
This truth, showing Jesus' divine origin, was immediately
grasped by the first Christians for its important
significance and included among the key affirmations of
their faith. Son of Joseph according to the law, Jesus in
fact, by an extraordinary intervention of the Holy Spirit,
was in his humanity only the son of Mary, since he was born
without the intervention of man.
Mary's virginity thus acquires a unique value and casts new
light on the birth of Jesus and on the mystery of his
sonship, since the virginal generation is the sign that
Jesus has God himself as his Father.
Acknowledged and proclaimed by the faith of the Fathers, the
virginal motherhood can never be separated from the identity
of Jesus, true God and true man, as "born of the Virgin
Mary", as we profess in the Nicene-Constantinopolitan Creed.
Mary is the only Virgin who is also a Mother. The
extraordinary co-presence of these two gifts in the person
of the maiden of Nazareth has led Christians to call Mary
simply "the Virgin", even when they celebrate her
motherhood.
The virginity of Mary thus initiates in the Christian
community the spread of the virginal life embraced by all
who are called to it by the Lord. This special vocation,
which reaches its apex in Christ's example, represents
immeasurable spiritual wealth for the Church in every age,
which finds in Mary her inspiration and model
'Mother of God' was expression of popular piety
4 The assertion: "Jesus was born of the Virgin Mary" already
implies in this event a transcendent mystery, which can find
its most complete expression only in the truth of Jesus'
divine sonship. The truth of Mary's divine motherhood is
closely tied to this central statement of the Christian
faith: she is indeed the Mother of the Incarnate Word, in
whom is "God from God ... true God from me God".
The title "Mother of God", already attested by Matthew in
the equivalent expression "Mother of Emmanuel", God-with-us
(cf. Mt 1.23), was explicitly attributed to Mary only after
a reflection that embraced about two centuries. It is
third-century Christians in Egypt who begin to invoke Mary
as "Theotókos", Mother of God.
With this title, which is broadly echoed in the devotion of
the Christian people, Mary is seen in the true dimension of
her motherhood: she is the Mother of God's Son, whom she
virginally begot according to his human nature and raised
him with her motherly love, thus contributing to the human
growth of the dime person who came to transform the destiny
of mankind.
5. In a highly significant way, the most ancient prayer to
Mary ("Sub tuum praesidium...", "We fly to thy
patronage...") contains the invocation: "Theotókos, Mother
of God". This title did not originally come from the
reflection of theologians, but from an intuition of faith of
the Christian people. Those who acknowledge Jesus as God
address Mary as the Mother of God and hope to obtain her
powerful aid in the trials of life.
The Council of Ephesus in 431 defined the dogma of the
divine motherhood, officially attributing to Mary the title
"Theotókos" in reference to the one person of Christ, true
God and true man.
The three expressions which the Church has used down the
centuries to describe her faith in the motherhood of Mary:
"Mother of Jesus", "Virgin Mother" and "Mother of God", thus
show that Mary's motherhood is intimately linked with the
mystery of the Incarnation. They are affirmations of
doctrine, connected as well with popular piety, which help
define the very identity of Christ.
Taken from:
L'Osservatore Romano
Weekly Edition in English
20 September 1995
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