CAPG's Blog 

"A FEAST in memory of a church built and dedicated to Almighty God, in honor of the Blessed Virgin by a special revelation. The church is called St. Mary Major, or the Greater, because it is the oldest and most important of those dedicated in honor of our Blessed Lady. It is also called St. Mary ad Nives, or at the Snow, from a popular tradition that the Mother of God chose this place for a church under her invocation, by a miraculous snow, which fell upon this spot on this day, when the heat is greatest at Rome, and by a vision in which she appeared to a patrician named John, who munificently founded and endowed this church in the time of Pope Liberius, in 385. Give thanks to God for all his wonders, and recommend yourself to the prayers of the Blessed Virgin, whom God was pleased to honor this day with so signal a miracle. Pray that her innocence and virtue may be the model of your life. The greatest honor which you can shew her, is in the imitation of her sanctity: and without this, all other acknowledgments are vain. On this dedication, examine your behavior in the house of God. See whether it be always with that decency and reverence which becomes the presence of God. Can you expect blessings from his hands, if you are there affronting him to his face? And what else is your talking and idle gazing about in that holy place? His awful majesty fills the church, and so it ought to do your heart, as long as you are there. If your thoughts or eyes are fixed on any other, is it God whom you then adore? Or may you not fear that you have other gods besides him? Be severe with yourself in this point: banish all manner of levity and disrespect: let a true sense of God command your whole behavior. Be there as a criminal before his judge, as a poor helpless creature before his sovereign Lord. Thus you will honor your God, and render him propitious in hearing and granting your petitions." The Catholic Year by Fr. John Gother