V. Section V – Mary Taught Jesus in His Sacred Humanity to Pray, and We Must Learn from Her
Christian theology confesses a profound mystery: Jesus Christ is true God and true man. In His divinity He is eternally one with the Father. In His humanity He learns, develops, and grows as every human child does. This truth, solemnly defined by the Church, allows us to make an extraordinary claim with complete confidence. Mary, in her maternal vocation, taught Jesus to pray according to His Sacred Humanity.
This is not a diminution of Christ. It is the glory of the Incarnation. The eternal Son truly assumed our nature, embracing its pattern of growth. Saint Luke tells us that Jesus “increased in wisdom and in stature, and in favor with God and man.”¹ Growth in wisdom includes genuine human learning. Within that development, Mary plays an essential role. She does not teach the eternal Word how to be God; she teaches Him how to express, as man, the perfect communion He possesses by nature. She forms His human voice within the rhythms of Israel’s prayer. She shapes His early understanding of the Psalms, the feasts, the blessings, and the language of praise.
Mary’s own interior life becomes the environment in which Jesus’ human prayer unfolds. She who pondered the mysteries of God in her heart also pondered the growth of her Son. Teresa of Avila emphasizes the importance of example and atmosphere in forming souls in prayer, noting that hearts are shaped by what they see and by those whose love surrounds them.² There is no earthly example more perfect for the child Jesus than the immaculate heart of His Mother.
Aquinas helps articulate the theological precision behind this mystery. Christ’s soul is filled with grace, yet He allows that grace to operate through the genuine processes of human development.³ His human intellect and will are real and active, not overwhelmed or bypassed by His Divinity. This means the child Jesus truly experiences learning proper to human life. Within this framework, Mary’s instruction is not symbolic but real. She nurtures the human faculties through which Christ will later preach, heal, bless, and pray in public.
Saint John Henry Newman reflects on this with characteristic insight, calling the Holy Family “the school of the Gospel,” the first place where Christian virtue is lived and learned.⁴ Nazareth becomes the hidden monastery of the Christian world, the home where prayer forms the atmosphere of daily life. In that silent school, Mary is the primary teacher. Her fidelity, obedience, charity, and quiet contemplation shape the Sacred Humanity of Christ.
If Jesus in His human nature learned to pray within Mary’s maternal presence, then it follows that we, adopted children of God, must look to her as teacher as well. Christ gives her to us from the Cross, entrusting His Mother to the beloved disciple and, through him, to all believers.⁵ Mary’s mission does not end in Nazareth. She continues to form Christians in prayer, guiding them as she once guided her Son.
The saints testify that Mary never draws souls away from Christ but always leads them to Him. Louis de Montfort writes that Mary’s influence is gentle yet decisive; she forms Jesus in us as she once formed Him in Nazareth.⁶ Her maternal touch arranges the interior life in order, strengthens the will, and disposes the heart to receive grace. When Mary teaches us to pray, she is helping us echo the prayer of her Son, who often withdrew to speak with His Father.
Mary teaches dispositions rather than techniques. She teaches listening before speaking, surrender before acting, perseverance before consolation. [She teaches how to remain beneath the Cross when understanding is incomplete, and how to wait upon the Holy Spirit as she did at the Annunciation and at Pentecost. Above all, she teaches quiet confidence that God’s word is trustworthy and will bear fruit in its time.]
To follow Christ is to desire His mind and His heart. If the human heart of Jesus was formed in the school of Mary, then our hearts will be formed most fruitfully there as well. Mary teaches us to love God with simplicity, to trust without reserve, and to pray with a heart that is faithful, receptive, and wholly given to Him.
The Incarnation reveals not only who God is but how He sanctifies us. He begins in a home, through a Mother, in silence, in prayer. That same pattern continues in the Christian life. We grow into Christ when we allow Mary to draw us into the school of Nazareth, where she once taught her Son to pray and now teaches us to do the same.
Reflection Question
How might I invite Mary this week to shape my prayer as she once shaped the human prayer of Jesus?
Citations
¹ Luke 2:52, RSV-2CE.
² Teresa of Avila, The Book of Her Life, trans. Kieran Kavanaugh and Otilio Rodriguez (ICS Publications, 1987), 11.
³ Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologiae, III, q. 9, a. 4.
⁴ John Henry Newman, Meditations and Devotions (Longmans, Green, and Co., 1893), 405.
⁵ John 19:26–27, RSV-2CE.
⁶ Louis-Marie Grignion de Montfort, True Devotion to Mary, trans. Frederick William Faber (Tan Books, 2010), 32–33.
Satan cant abide Mry, challenging to see disconnection between people who love their own mother. Aquinas grace builds on nature, don’t transfer that same affection to the BVM at eh foot of the cross. Hard to yield to her instruction if don’t love her.
Those who love her, we must be more faithful. Seems few people are willing to called her blessed.
White House addressed Immaculate Conception on Dec 8. Small incremental changes given the respect she deserves. This will go a long way.
Mary loved Our Lord with the greatest intimacy. She longs for us to be in heaven. She is a gentle Mother. Our Lady of Sorrows, carries those sorrows out of love for us.
Jan 1, in honor of Mry Mother of God. Profound exclamation point. Teaching children of the Church must be under her tutelage.