My Beloved the Benevolent                                    August 2025

Grace and peace, wishing you every goodness and blessings

I am pleased to congratulate you all on the Virgin Mary’s Fast, which begins on Thursday, August 7th and ends with our celebration of the feast of the manifestation of the preserved body of the Virgin in heaven to the disciples on Friday, August 22^nd. During the fast, we celebrate the Feast of the Transfiguration, one of the most important feasts of Our Lord, on Tuesday, August 19th. I wish you all an accepted and blessed fast and joyful feasts.

The Virgin Mary’s Fast holds a special place in all our hearts because of the love and special place the Virgin, the Mother of Light, holds in our hearts. It is true that all fasts are an act of worship we offer to God, but the Church has given names to fasts to remind believers of the special occasion related to the fast. The Virgin Mary’s Fast is called the Virgin Mary’s Fast because it ends with one of the feasts of the Virgin, which is the feast of the manifestation of the body of the Virgin Mary preserved in heaven to the disciples. The Church also named this fast after the Virgin Mary to lift our hearts and minds to the Virgin, the Mother of God, so that we may imitate her and ask for her prayers and intercession for the forgiveness of our sins and the salvation of our souls.

The Church reminds us not only of the Virgin Mary on the occasions of her feasts, but every day in our prayers and praises we remember the Virgin Mary and ask for her intercession. One of the beautiful prayers the Church has in place to remind us of the Virgin Mary and encourage us to seek her intercession is the prayer called “Hail to you O Mary” which we pray in the Matins and the Compline Hours. We also pray it during the Raising of Incense in Matins and Vespers as an introduction to the Doxologies. Therefore, I want to contemplate with you on this beautiful prayer…

+Hail to you, O Mary:

This prayer is divided into three sections, each section beginning with “Hail to the Virgin” and ending with asking for her to intercede and raise our prayers before our Lord Jesus Christ to forgive us our sins.

In the first section we pray, “Hail to you, we ask you, saint full of glory, the Ever-Virgin, the Mother of God, the Mother of Christ, lift up our prayers unto your beloved Son, that He may forgive us our sins”.

We begin the prayer by greeting the Virgin, “Hail to you,” just as the angel greeted the Virgin when he gave her the good news of the holy conception, “and having come in, the angel said to her, ‘Rejoice O full of grace, the Lord is with you; blessed are you among women!’” Luke 1:28. We greet the Virgin as the angel did and remember the important qualities of the virgin.

+ Full of grace:

The great glory that God bestowed upon the Virgin was not attained by mankind but surpassed the Cherubim and Seraphim in glory because she truly deserved to be called the Mother of God: that the Son of God should come and take perfect human nature with a rational soul from the Virgin by the work of the Holy Spirit.

+Ever virgin:

We confess the perpetual virginity of St. Mary for she was a virgin before conception, a virgin during the birth of Christ, and a virgin after the birth of Christ.

+ Mother of God or Theotokos:

This important theological expression acquired special importance after the start of the Nestorian heresy anathematized by the Ecumenical Council of Ephesus in 431AD, confirming what the Bible said, “That Holy one who is to be born of you will be called the Son of God” Luke 1:35 and also, “Behold the virgin shall be with child, and bear a Son, and they shall call His name Immanuel, which is translated God is with us.” Matthew 1:23.

+The Virgin Mother of Christ:

She is also the Mother of Christ, God the incarnate, fully divine, fully human and as the Bible called her, “the Mother of Jesus” John 2:1.

+Raise our prayers to your beloved Son to forgive us our sins:

Frequently throughout the prayer, we ask for the intercession of the Virgin for the forgiveness of our sins. At the end of the second section, we pray, “Intercede for us before Christ, Whom you bore, that He may grant us the forgiveness of our sins.” In the third section, we pray, “We ask you to remember us, O trusted intercessor before our Lord Jesus Christ, to forgive us our sins.” In the second section we pray, “Peace to the one who gave birth to us the true light of Christ our God.” In the third section we pray “Peace to you, Hail to you, O Virgin, the right and true queen. Hail to the pride of our race, you bore for us Emmanuel.”

We pray and ask for the intercession of the Virgin Mary, Mother of Light, faithful and trusted advocate, to raise our prayers to her beloved Son, to have compassion on the whole world and to make us compassionate toward each other.

May the Lord bless your gifts to support Santa Verena Charity programs.

Metropolitan Serapion