Good evening, Father Bellon,
in a four-page brochure published by the Diocese of …, Mary is referred to as Queen of the Apostles: is that true?
Thank you very much and best regards.
Carmelo
Priest’s Response
Dear Carmelo,
1. Mary is Queen of the Apostles in her own right.
This title is also found in the Litany of Loreto.
2. She was an exemplary Apostle when she visited her cousin Elizabeth.
The sacred text notes that, upon hearing her voice, Elizabeth was filled with the Holy Spirit and was the first to praise Mary, saying: “Blessed are you among women, and blessed is the fruit of your womb!” (Luke 1:42).
At that very moment, the child she carried in her womb (John the Baptist) leaped for joy!
In that leap of joy, completely different in intensity from the normal movements of a child in his mother’s womb, an extraordinary sanctification took place in him: purification from original sin and an abundant outpouring of grace that, according to St. Thomas, made him almost incapable of committing sin, as befitted one who was to be the forerunner of Our Lord.
At that moment, what Gabriel had said to his father Zechariah was fulfilled: “He will be filled with the Holy Spirit, even while he is still in his mother’s womb, and he will turn many of the children of Israel to the Lord their God. He will go before him in the spirit and power of Elijah, to turn the hearts of the fathers to their children, and the disobedient to the wisdom of the just, and to make ready a people prepared for the Lord” (Luke 1:15-17).
3. Furthermore, it must be remembered that Our Lady, with the incarnation of God in her womb, received a new and abundant sanctification, somewhat different from that which she had received at the beginning of her existence.
Indeed, at the beginning of her life, she received it to become a worthy Mother of God.
At the moment of the Incarnation of the Word, she received it so that the people she would encounter would be infected by her holiness and purity. Her virtues, in fact, were “transfusive,” they infected those who approached her.
4. Who knows how the people who found themselves in her company on the journey to and from her cousin Elizabeth felt purified and in some way even sanctified by her presence.
At the dawn of creation, God had said that he would put enmity between the devil and the Woman from whose lineage the Savior would be born (see Gen 3:15).
Of Saint Catherine of Siena, we read that people vied with one another to keep her close because “when she spoke, she communicated a certain something that so incited the minds of men to the good and the pleasure of God that all sadness vanished from the hearts of those who listened. All internal affliction also vanished, they forgot all their troubles, and felt themselves overcome by a great tranquility of spirit, so great that each one, amazed at himself and enjoying a new pleasure, thought to himself: It is good to be here; let us make three tabernacles for ourselves forever” (Life of Saint Catherine of Siena, Legenda major, no. 27).
Blessed Raymond of Capua, her confessor and biographer, comments: “Nor should we be surprised, for undoubtedly He who, transfigured on the mountain, forced Peter to utter such words, was invisibly hidden in the bride’s breast” (ibid.).
5. If this happened to Saint Catherine, what should not happen to Our Lady, whose holiness surpassed that of all the Saints put together?
Mary, therefore, silently became an Apostle long before the Apostles, and with such a fullness of grace that she was rightly proclaimed Queen of the Apostles.
6. But there is more: if the Apostles were ministers of God, Mary was much more because she became the Mother of God.
And if the Apostles became communicators of some of the benefits of redemption, Mary surpasses them all because she was, is, and will forever be the distributor of all the graces of redemption.
7. Finally, Sacred Scripture also contains a clear allusion to Mary as Queen of the Apostles. In fact, we read in Revelation 12:1: “A great sign appeared in heaven: a woman clothed with the sun, with the moon under her feet, and on her head a crown of twelve stars.”
This woman certainly represents the Church.
But the Jerusalem Bible adds: “It is possible that John is thinking of Mary, the new Eve, the daughter of Zion who gave birth to the Messiah.”
And Marco Sales: “Since Mary Most Holy is the Mother of the Church, as Saint Ambrose says, it follows that several features of this description can be especially appropriated to the Virgin, as Saint Augustine, Saint Ambrose, Saint Bernard, etc. did.”
With the best wishes for every good received from the Queen of the Apostles, I bless you and remember you in prayer,
Father Angelo
