Today the churches of the East and West celebrate the birth of Mary, the mother of the Lord. The first source that recounts the event is the so-called Protoevangelium of James according to which Mary was born in Jerusalem in the house of Joachim and Anna. Here in the 4th century the Basilica of Saint Anna was built and on the day of its dedication the nativity of the Mother of God was celebrated. The festival then spread to Constantinople and was introduced to the West by Sergius I, a pope of Syrian origin. «Those that God has always known, he also predestined them": Dante almost seems to paraphrase Saint Paul's verse when he defines Mary as "fixed term of eternal counsel".
From eternity, The Father works for the preparation of the All-Holy, of She who was to become the mother of her Son, the temple of the Holy Spirit. The geneaology of Jesus proposed by the Gospel of Matthew culminates in the expression «Joseph, Mary's husband, from which Jesus called Christ was born". With Mary, so, the hour of the definitive David has come, of the full establishment of the kingdom of God. Furthermore, with his birth the womb offered by humanity to God takes shape so that the incarnation of the Word in the history of men takes place. Finally, Mary as a child is also an image of the new humanity, the one from whom her Son will remove the heart of stone to give her a heart of flesh that accepts the precepts of God in docility.
By honoring the nativity of the Mother of God we go to the true meaning and purpose of this event which is the incarnation of the Word. In fact, Mary is born, she is nursed and raised to be the Mother of the King of the Ages, of God”. This is, after all, the reason why Maria alone (as well as S. John the Baptist and of course Christ) it is not only celebrated there ” birth to heaven “, as happens with other saints, but also the coming into this world. Actually, the wonder of this birth is not in what the apocrypha narrates with great detail and naivety, but rather in the significant step forward that God takes in the implementation of his eternal plan of love. For this reason today's feast was celebrated with magnificent praise by many holy Fathers, who drew on their knowledge of the Bible and their sensitivity and poetic ardor. Let's read some expressions of the second Sermon on the Nativity of Mary of St. Pier Damiani: “God almighty, before the man fell, he foresaw his fall and decided, before the ages, human redemption. He therefore decided to incarnate himself in Mary".
“Today is the day God begins to put his eternal plan into practice, for it was necessary for the house to be built, before the King came down to live there. Beautiful house, so long as, if Wisdom built herself a house with seven carved columns, this palace of Mary rests on the seven gifts of the Holy Spirit. Solomon solemnly celebrated the inauguration of a stone temple. How we will celebrate the birth of Mary, temple of the incarnate Word? On that day the glory of God descended on the temple of Jerusalem in the form of a cloud, which obscured it. The Lord who makes the sun shine in the heavens, for his home among us he has chosen darkness (1 Re 8,10-12), said Solomon in his prayer to God. This new temple will be filled by God himself, who comes to be the light of the people.
“To the darkness of Gentileism and the lack of faith of the Jews, represented by the temple of Solomon, the bright day happens in the temple of Mary. That's right, so, sing this day and She who is born in it”.
Source: Saints and Blesseds