The “Hail Mary” is a prayer of thanks to God and Mary for her participating role of bringing our Savior Jesus into the world to fulfill God’s promise to Adam and Eve to save them and their children from the Original Sin that closed the doors of Eternal Heaven. It is also a prayer asking Mary to be our intercessor before God, her Son, Jesus.
We start by praying, “Hail, Mary, …”,
or simply, “Hello/Rejoice Mary” calling her by name in a simple friendly manner recognizing her as our mother whom Jesus gave to us from the cross, just as he gave her to St. John.
“…Mary, full of Grace, the Lord is with Thee, …”
All credit goes not only to Mary but to all the generations of the human race back to Adam and Eve who by their prayers and sacrifices have merited an accumulation of Graces which were spiritually passed on from one generation to the next in the lineage that led to the Blessed Mary’s parents, Anna and Joachim.
Finally in the old age of Anna and Joachim enough grace had been merited and accumulated that, according to the visions of Blessed Anne Catherine Emmerich, the Holy Spirit descended upon them and purified their souls. By a special favor and grace, God in advance of Jesus’ death on the Cross, removed their Original Sin and they conceived the Blessed Virgin Mary free of Original Sin.
This explains how grace was restored that was lost from Adam and Eve, and Mary was born without Original Sin by Jesus’ Saving Grace on the Cross that was not restricted by human Time. Thus, Mary being pure, she was an acceptable tabernacle to receive the Second Person of the Holy Trinity and be His mother.
At Mary’s birth, therefore, she was full of grace. Grace was infused into her soul even as it was for Adam and Eve who were also born pure. However, from the instant they decided to sin and chose to take action to sin, grace was removed from their soul: they were no longer “full of grace”.
Mary’s distinction is that she never sinned and that the fullness of grace she was born into was never lost. Rather, with the practice of every Virtue she gained more and more Grace. She, therefore, is the champion of our human race by completing her life and always saying, “yes” to God, and “no” to her human nature and the world’s temptations.
She is also said to be the champion of all Virtue, by developing it to a greater perfection than all the Saints and Angels combined. There has to be some creation of God that has reached a higher perfection of a Virtue more than another creature. That is logical and reasonable. The Blessed Virgin Mary is that person. God pours His grace into whom ever asks, and the Blessed Virgin Mary is the largest vessel of God’s grace by His blessings and her desire for those blessings.
Blessed Anne Catherine Emmerich’s visions said that the angels in heaven were shown the Blessed Virgin Mary in advance of Time and that she would be the first of all of God’s creation by merit of God’s grace. They were told to honor her as such, that she would be second only to the Word incarnate, Jesus. Lucifer refused to honor her calling Mary inferior to himself and one third of the angels in heaven joined Lucifer in a revolt against God and the other angels. Lucifer lost and the rest of the story is now being played out in our human history with the culmination of the story foretold in the Book of Revelation.
Genesis 3:15 says that “she, (Mary), shall crush thy head, (the serpent), and thou shall lie in wait for her heal.” [The Douay Rheims Bible, 1899, translated from the Latin Vulgate Bible]. The humility and obedience of Mary will crush the prideful head of Lucifer and his willful disobedience to God. A popular icon shows Mary standing on the globe of the world with her heal on the head of the serpent to represent our traditional belief of this mystery. From the above then is our understanding when we say, “… Mary, full of Grace, the Lord is with thee, …”
“… Blessed art thou among women, and Blessed is the fruit of thy womb, Jesus.”
“Blessed” is an acknowledgement that it is by God’s grace that Mary was chosen, born without Original Sin, remained free of sin and chosen to be the Woman destined from all Time to be the Mother of the Word Incarnate. It is accepted that in fact she is the Ever Virgin foretold in the Old Testament who gave birth to Jesus the Christ. She is the same Woman in the New Testament Book of Revelation that is the Virgin with Child.
The former stated part of the “Hail Mary” is Scriptural from what we call the Angelic Salutation of The Annunciation. This part of the “Hail Mary” is the Angel Gabriel’s words to Mary.
“… Holy Mary, Mother of God, pray for us sinners Now and at the Hour of Our Death” is our request for Mary to intercede for us. In print it was seen around 1495 and later the of Council Trent added this phrase to our Catechism around 1556.
Thus, the whole body of the Church acknowledges Mary’s role next to her Son in His answering her prayers on our behalf. Naturally we need immediate help, NOW; and most importantly we need help at, THE HOUR OF OUR DEATH, to say a final “yes” to God and “no” rejecting Satan that we may have eternal life in heaven.
It is God’s request that we honor Him my honoring the greatest of His creation: the Blessed Virgin Mary. We thus honor God by praying “Hail Mary”.
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