Okay, this is the time of year where there are all sorts of religious events going on; mainly Hanukah and Christmas. Today, Catholics had a sort of holiday known as a holy day of obligation where we go to mass and participate in a celebration of feast of the Immaculate Conception of Mary. This feast is something that many other religions and denominations of Christianity do not have (to my knowledge) so I am going to talk a little about it. For those of you who know what the Immaculate Conception and its feast day is this will be repetitive but feel free to let me know if I miss anything or mess anything up.
For those who are not Christian this may seem odd since it is a feast surrounding Mary who, while being the mother of God for us christens, is little more than another person to much of humanity. But even for those people of the world who do see Mary as the mother of God many of them do not put her in as such high regards so as to give her a feast day. The feast day is in remembrance the Immaculate Conception of Mary. This basically states that through the grace of God Mary was born without original sin (for those of you who are unaware in the Catholic Church we believe that all people are born with the original sin of Adam and Eve hence why we have baptism to cleanse us of said sin). From what I remember it is because it made it so that she was free from sin so that when Jesus was conceived he would be done so in a non-sinned body (though I may be off on that piece of information).
It also marks the point that is seventeen days from Christmas, which is just coincidental since it’s always the 8th of December, at least in the United States. But if you want to celebrate it as a marker of seventeen days out go for it.
Mary holds an important place in Catholicism since she is the mother of God and therefore she is venerated, which should not be confused with worshiped. We respect her as a pinnacle of humanity; the best mankind can be since she was without sin. Her humble service to God is something that Catholics and other religious groups respect. Catholics will frequently ask for her intercessions or for her to pray for us to God for grace.
Well I hope that was informative to some degree. Have a safe and productive day.
Tomorrow: Candy
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