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Introduction
 Saint Augustine says
that if we wish to win the favor of the saints with greater certainty
and in greater abundance, we must imitate them. When they see us imitating
their virtues, they are more inclined to pray for us. As soon as the queen
of saints and our chief advocate, Mary, delivers a soul from the grasp
of Lucifer and unites it to God, she wants it to imitate her. Otherwise,
she cannot enrich the soul with graces. Mary called blessed those
who imitate her life diligently: Now, therefore, children, hear me; blessed are
they that keep my ways (Prov 8:32). There is a proverb that lovers
come to resemble the persons they love: "Love either finds or makes
lovers alike." Saint Sophronius urges us to strive to imitate Mary
if we love her, because this is the best way to please her: "My beloved
children, serve Mary, whom you love. You will prove that you love her if you
endeavor to imitate her." Richard of Saint Lawrence says: "They are true children of Mary
and can call themselves true children, who strive to imitate her life." "Let
a child, then," concludes Saint Bernard, "imitate his mother,
if he wants to have her favor; for when Mary sees herself treated as a mother,
she will treat him as her child."
Although the Gospels have little
to say about Mary's virtues in detail, we do learn from them that she was full
of grace, and this implies that she possessed all virtues in a heroic
degree. "So much so," says Saint Thomas, "that whereas
other saints excelled in some particular virtue - one in chastity, another in humility,
another in mercy - the Blessed Virgin excelled in all, and is offered to us as a model
of all." Saint Ambrose says: "Mary was so outstanding that her life
was a model for everybody." And he concludes with the words: "Let
the
virginity and the life of Mary be ever before your eyes like an image, in
which the form of virtue is resplendent. You will learn from that image
how to live, what to correct, what to avoid, and what to retain."
Since humility is the foundation
of all the virtues - as the Fathers of the Church teach
- let us consider
in the first place how great Mary's humility was.
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