The Decree of the Sacred Congregation of Rites (12th January, 1921) authorising the Office and Mass of our Lady ‘Mediatrix Gratiarum’ (Mediatrix of Graces), has given rise to a theological discussion on the nature of this mediatorship of our Blessed Lady..

The most common, and perhaps the most convenient, formula of this mediatorship is :

All Graces come through Mary, the Mother

This formula has two meanings. First, all graces come through Mary because Jesus Christ, the Divine Redeemer, came through her. Second, all graces come through Mary because her intercession is now a preliminary of the distribution of all graces. We will discuss these two meanings separately.

All Graces come through Mary because Jesus Christy, the Divine Redeemer, came through her.

(1) Our Blessed Lady’s greatest title is that given by the Council of Ephesus, namely, θϵoτóκoζ Deipara” Mother of God. For His own inscrutable ends God chose to take flesh miraculously in the virgin womb, arid after the free consent of Mary, the wife of St. Joseph of Nazareth.

(2) Our Blessed Lady did not merit as such the Incarnation. St. Thomas says that no one could have merited the Incarnation condignly (ex condigno), ‘yet the holy Fathers merited the Incarnation congruously by desiring and beseeching; for it was becoming (congruum) that God should hearken to those who obeyed Him’ (III Qu. 2, Art. 2, Eng. trans.).