All Women Have Been Restored Through The Dignity Of Mary
ALL WOMEN HAVE BEEN RESTORED
THROUGH THE DIGNITY OF MARY
Now let us consider in what respects the Virgin Mary is Blessed; a title first given her by the Angel, and next by the Church in all ages since to this day.
I observe, that in her the curse pronounced on Eve was changed to a blessing. Eve was doomed to bear children in sorrow, but now this very dispensation, in which the token of Divine anger was conveyed, was made the means by which salvation came into the world. Christ might have descended from heaven, as He went back, and as He will come again. He might have taken on Himself a body from the ground, as Adam was given, or been formed, like Eve, in some other divinely-devised way. But, far from this, God sent forth His Son, “made of a woman.” For it has been His gracious purpose to turn all that is ours from evil to good. Had He so pleased, He might have found, when we sinned, other beings to do Him service, casting us into hell; but He purposed to save and to change us. And in like manner all that belongs to us, our reason, our affections, our pursuits, our relations in life, He needs nothing put aside in His disciples, but all sanctified. Therefore, instead of sending His Son from heaven, He sent Him forth as the Son of Mary, to show that all our sorrow and all our corruption can be blessed and changed by Him. The very punishment of the fall, the very taint of original sin, admits of a cure by the coming of Christ.
But there is another portion of the original punishment of woman, which may be considered as repealed when Christ came. It was said to the woman, “Thy husband shall rule over thee;” a sentence which has been strikingly fulfilled. Man has strength to conquer the thorns and thistles which the earth is cursed with, but the same strength has ever proved the fulfilment of the punishment awarded to the woman.
But when Christ came as the seed of the woman, He vindicated the rights and honor of His mother. Not that the distinction of ranks is destroyed under the Gospel; the woman is still made inferior to man, as he to Christ—but the slavery is done away with. St. Peter bids the husband “give honor unto the wife, because the weaker, in that both are heirs of the grace of life.” (1 Pet. 3:7). And St. Paul, while enjoining subjection upon her, speaks of the especial blessedness promised to her in being the appointed entrance of the Savior into the world. “Adam was first formed, then Eve; and Adam was not deceived, but the woman being deceived was in the transgression.” But “notwithstanding, she shall be saved through the Child-bearing;” (1 Tim. 2:15), that is, through the birth of Christ from Mary, which was a blessing, as upon all mankind, so peculiarly upon the woman. Accordingly, from that time, Marriage has not only been restored to its original dignity, but even gifted with a spiritual privilege, as the outward symbol of the heavenly union subsisting betwixt Christ and His Church.
In this way, the Blessed Virgin, in bearing our Lord, has taken off or lightened the peculiar disgrace which the woman inherited for seducing Adam, sanctifying the one part of it, repealing the other.
But further, she is doubtless to be accounted blessed and favored in herself, as well as in the benefits she has done us. Who can estimate the holiness and perfection of her, who was chosen to be the Mother of Christ? If to him that has, more is to be given, and holiness and Divine favor go together, then what must have been the transcendent purity of her, whom the Creator Spirit condescended to overshadow with His miraculous presence?
–Parochial and Plain Sermons, II