Mariology

Father Hardon’s writings on Mariology explore the role of the Blessed Virgin Mary in salvation history and Catholic spirituality. These articles examine Marian doctrine, devotion, apparitions, motherhood, and Mary’s unique relationship with Christ and the Church.

Devotion to Our Lady

By Father John A. Hardon, S.J. Over the years in speaking on the Blessed Virgin Mary, you naturally fall into certain categories and almost routine ways of speaking about Our Lady. Yet, as with anything we love, repetition is no hindrance to the increase of our affection. Devotion to the Blessed Virgin is one of […]

The History of Consecration to the Immaculate Heart of Mary

By Father John A. Hardon, S.J. The Fatima consecration to Our Lady has an ancient history. It is all the more important to see something of this history in the light of some reservations and even criticism of what we know goes back to the early centuries of the Church. A key to the meaning […]

Immaculate Heart of Mary

By Father John A. Hardon, S.J. Though not a dogma of the Church, there is a close relationship between devotion to the Sacred Heart of Jesus and the Immaculate Heart of His Mother. Pope Pius XII said it was fitting that after our homage paid to the Sacred Heart of Jesus, Christian people should manifest […]

Love for Mary, Model of Consecrated Life

By Father John A. Hardon, S.J. The word “model” has been cheapened in the English language. Among other definitions in the latest third International Dictionary, a model is defined as “one who is employed to display clothes or merchandise, as in a fashion show, in a photograph or on television.” Yet we know that a […]

The Magnificat: Mary’s Own Prayer

By Father John A. Hardon, S.J. We have many reasons to give due consideration and prayerful reflection to the Magnificat. It is the longest discourse recorded of Mary in Divine Revelation. Many are the stories written telling about the heart of Mary as shown in that beautiful prayer. Certainly inspired, it was pronounced by Mary […]

Marian Practices of Piety

By Father John A. Hardon, S.J. Our present conference is, again, on the Blessed Virgin in our lives and more specifically on Marian practises of Piety. We have already said that devotion, in this case to the Blessed Virgin, is a composite of veneration, imitation and invocation. In our present conference, and I should add, […]

Mary, The Mother of God

By Father John A. Hardon, S.J. In 1970, Pope Paul VI instituted January 1 as the feast of Mary, Mother of God. This was to replace the feast of Our Lord’s Circumcision, and place the Latin Rite in accord with the Eastern tradition of the Catholic Church. It would also supplant the former feast of […]

The Mariology of Pope Pius XII

By Father John A. Hardon, S.J. It is easy to write on Pope Pius XII and the Blessed Virgin Mary because there is so much to say. We might recall how as a young boy in Rome he would stop every day to visit the shrine of Madonna della Strada at the Church of the […]

Mary: Mediatrix in the Theology of Bellarmine

By Father John A. Hardon, S.J. The first apparition of our Blessed Mother at Fatima occurred just thirty years ago on May 13, 1917. It may have been only a coincidence that a few years later the Holy Father should have chosen May 13 as the Feast of St. Robert Bellarmine, Confessor and Doctor of […]

Mary, Mother of the Church

By Father John A. Hardon, S.J. There is a special appropriateness in speaking on Mary, Mother of the Church at this time. We are speaking on a Saturday, which from post-apostolic times has been considered Mary’s Day. Why, because, as the Fathers of the Church explain; of all the followers of Christ, Our Lady was […]

Mariology: Mary as Mother of God

By Father John A. Hardon, S.J. In the nature of things, our treatment will be theological, and we will have to resort to certain facts of history and statements of doctrine that are somewhat technical. There are three basic errors which occasioned the Church’s defining Mary’s divine maternity. Ever since its definition by the Council […]

Mary in the Modern World

By Father John A. Hardon, S.J. Why Mary? Devotion to Mary’s dogmatic titles simply means loving her and imitating her virtues. Christianity would be meaningless without the Blessed Virgin. Her quiet presence opened Christian history at the Incarnation and will continue to pervade the Church’s history until the end of time. Our purpose in this […]

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