Today, September 8, the worldwide Armenian Church celebrates the Feast of the Nativity of the Holy Mother-of-God.
The Armenian Church styles her Sourp Asdvadzadzin, a name that graces many of our churches, and inspires the faithful with reverent love.
But behind the grand, even cosmic implications of her title stands St. Mary herself: a girl of humble piety, who was chosen, and who freely consented, to carry the Hope of the World within her body, and deliver Him as a baby in Bethlehem.
Mary was born to Joachim and Anna, a devout couple whose earnest prayers for a child were answered with the birth of a precious daughter. That birth is not recorded in the Gospel, but in all likelihood it occurred in Bethlehem or Nazareth, not more than 20 years before Christ’s nativity.
The classic iconography of the family stresses the tenderness uniting them, with the parents often shown embracing the infant Mary, or expressing delight in their miraculous little girl.
The Armenian Church has celebrated the Nativity of St. Mary since the 13th century, and formally recognized her as the “Mother-of-God” even earlier, as a result of the Ecumenical Council of Ephesus in the 5th century.
Her life of holiness and purity, and her graceful acceptance of the role to which God called her, as the mother of Jesus Christ, all make Mary one of our pre-eminent exemplars of the Christian faith, whose birth and very conception are joyous occasions in the church.