From 'Mother of God' to 'Co-Redemptrix'
Staving Off the Prophecy of Akita and the Threat of Apostasy
In 431 A.D. at the Council of Ephesus, re-affirmation of the title “Mother of God” [in Greek, Theotokos] was necessary to preserve and re-affirm orthodoxy. “Theotokos” re-affirmed the mystery of Christ’s two natures, fully God and fully man in the Person of the Word. The child born of the Virgin Mary was always and only the eternal Person of the Word made flesh. Contrary to misrepresentations of that time, Jesus was not a human person who was later joined to or adopted by the Word. From the moment his humanity began to form, Jesus was always and only the eternal and divine Person, the Word. The Logos (the Word) took to himself a human nature in the womb of the Virgin Mary. God was made man. The title “Mother of God” protected the mystery of the Incarnation of God from misled theologians who were overly and scrupulously concerned with how the title could be misunderstood. Perfect love casts out fear and the devil.
The simple title “Theotokos” kept intact the authentic mystery of the Incarnation. To use and proclaim the title “Mother of God” was an affirmation of the great mystery that God had become a man because “God so loved the world” (John 3:16). To honor the Virgin Mary by calling her “Mother of God” was to continue to cast the lies of the devil and the devil’s kingdom out of this world. Calling Mary “Mother of God” was proclaiming the true faith that Jesus is God and Lord “to the glory of God the Father” (Phil 2:11; cf. Jn 20:28). To honor the Virgin Mary as “Mother of God” is to fight the lie of the devil that God does not love us or that humans do not matter. Humans like the Virgin Mary can be called into the service of human salvation and actually assist God by free cooperation in God’s plan of joining heaven and earth in the Person of the Word.
Humans still cooperate in God’s plan and service. To honor the Virgin Mary as “Mother of God” is to help fulfill that the Woman of Genesis 3:15 – along with her
”seed” or “offspring” – ultimately will crush the head of the serpent. The Book of Revelation shows that “the Woman” and her seed and the serpent and his seed (of Genesis 3:15) are finally realized in an ultimate battle which portrays Jesus (Rev 12:2-5) and his mystical body – which are the Woman and her children (Rev 12:17) – fighting a war against the ancient serpent (Satan and his angels) in Revelation 12. The woman and her seed clearly have a role to play in Christ’s kingdom; especially so that their freedom is exercised so as to consolidate within themselves the Kingdom of God’s Son: “Blessed are those who hear the word of God and keep it.” The promise of salvation as announced in Genesis is more fully understood and unveiled [apocalypse] in the fullness of time as depicted in the Book of Revelation.
Fifteen hundred years after the Council of Ephesus, the Second Vatican Council took up the imagery that “the Woman” of Revelation 12 is both a member of the mystical body of Jesus (which must crush the head of the Serpent) and that she is also Mother of the Mystical Body, the Church. It did this by placing Mariology within the final chapter of the “Dogmatic Constitution on the Church,” entitled Lumen Gentium. Combining the thought of Saint Ambrose and the thought of Matthias Scheeben, it purposefully shows Mary as “Mother of the Church” because she is its full sign and realization before all other members and because the Church imitates Mary as a Virgin Mother and Spouse of the Spirit. Mary is the spotless and immaculate virgin who through the Holy Spirit gives birth to what is heavenly while always remaining a virgin. Theotokos literally translates as God-bearer. The Church thus imitates Mary as the virgin mother and bride of Christ who gives heavenly life to humanity by Christ’s Spirit while always remaining virgin. [cf. LG #63]
Jesus can come to us through the Sacraments because he first came to us through the Virgin Mary. Saint Paul alludes to this analogy and pattern when he stated: “the Jerusalem above is free and she is our Mother” (cf. Galatians 4:26). While always the Woman and Mother whom God created, Mary is also a member of the Church because it was through Christ’s foreseen merits that she was conceived free of sin (the Immaculate Conception) and so could be the instrument Christ chose to assist him as Queen Mother for his kingdom. Uniquely redeemed, Mary can cooperate with Jesus and be his free and human instrument because her sanctity first comes from Christ which made her “Full of Grace” by the Holy Spirit.
After speaking that “the Jerusalem above is…our mother,” Saint Paul immediately turned to the prophecy of Isaiah 54:1 – which actually points to the Virgin Mary – and quoted Isaiah: “Rejoice, O barren one who does not bear; break forth and shout, you who are not in travail; for the children of the desolate one are many more than the children of her that is married” (Gal 4:27; Is 54:1). The prophecy of Isaiah 54:1 follows the ultimate “Suffering Servant” of Isaiah 53 who redeems God’s Israel and which was fulfilled in Jesus the Christ. Jesus was the ultimate Suffering Servant and his mother was momentarily the ultimate desolate (and “barren”) one at the foot of his Cross and upon his redemptive death. She is inseparably tied to the Cross and not just the Annunciation of his birth.
When Jesus gave her to be mother of his “beloved disciple” and told the “beloved disciple” from the Cross to accept his mother (Jn 19:26-27), a new spiritual motherhood was unveiled for every “beloved disciple,” namely those disciples “who keep God’s commandments and bear witness to Jesus” (Rev 12:17). By hearing God’s words from the Cross and keeping them, the disciples of Jesus take “the Woman” as their Mother and fulfill Isaiah 54:1 to the glory of Jesus Christ and his kingdom. Mary is Mother of the Church and mother of each and every disciple of Jesus. Her spiritual children are more numerous than those who exercise only an earthly motherhood. “The Son whom she brought forth is He whom God placed as the first-born among many brethren, namely the faithful, in whose birth and education she cooperates with a maternal love” [LG #63].
“Co-Redemptrix” is Needed to Re-affirm and Re-consolidate the Faith
The title “Mother of God” was necessary to protect and glorify the mystery of Christ’s true identity, but the title “Co-Redemptrix” will be necessary to preserve the mystery and identity of the true Church which is the mystery of “the Woman” and her “seed” of Revelation 12:17; one, holy, catholic, and apostolic. In the Dogmatic Constitution on the Church, Lumen Gentium, the Second Vatican Council clearly expressed that Mary had a unique role in the Redemption as Christ’s handmaid and disciple, and not only as his biological Mother:
Thus Mary, a daughter of Adam, consenting to the divine Word, became the mother of Jesus, the one and only Mediator. Embracing God's salvific will with a full heart and impeded by no sin, she devoted herself totally as a handmaid of the Lord to the person and work of her Son, under Him and with Him, by the grace of almighty God, serving the mystery of redemption. Rightly therefore the holy Fathers see her as used by God not merely in a passive way, but as freely cooperating in the work of human salvation through faith and obedience. For, as St. Irenaeus says, she ‘being obedient, became the cause of salvation for herself and for the whole human race.’ Hence not a few of the early Fathers gladly assert in their preaching, "The knot of Eve's disobedience was untied by Mary's obedience; what the virgin Eve bound through her unbelief, the Virgin Mary loosened by her faith." Comparing Mary with Eve, they call her ‘the Mother of the living,’ and still more often they say: ‘death through Eve, life through Mary.’ [LG #56, bold mine]
…the Blessed Virgin advanced in her pilgrimage of faith, and faithfully persevered in her union with her Son unto the cross, where she stood, in keeping with the divine plan, grieving exceedingly with her only begotten Son [cf. Isaiah 54:1], uniting herself with a maternal heart with His sacrifice, and lovingly consenting to the immolation of this Victim which she herself had brought forth. Finally, she was given by the same Christ Jesus dying on the cross as a mother to His disciple with these words: ‘Woman, behold thy son.’ [LG #58, bold mine]
Her obedience of faith was given at the Annunciation and then assisted at the Cross on behalf of the those who accepted his Sacrifice. Through her Immaculate Conception she was always participating in Christ’s work in view of our birth. In Lumen Gentium #56-58 above, is summarized what the Church has always understood when it referred to Mary as the New Eve and Co-Redemptrix. Those titles recall the fuller understanding of why the Mother of Jesus remained a Virgin (before, during, and after Christ), why Mary was conceived “without sin” [as the Immaculate Conception], why the Angel Gabriel called her “Full of Grace” at the Annunciation, and why Jesus Assumed Mary body and soul into heaven to continue her office and calling as Queen Mother of the kingdom. Lumen Gentium concludes these points by saying: “In this singular way she cooperated by her obedience, faith, hope and burning charity in the work of the Saviour in giving back supernatural life to souls. Wherefore she is our mother in the order of grace” [#61]. All of Mary's unique graces were to be the virginal mother of Jesus and remain a virgin in becoming our true mother who Jesus would give from the Cross.
As Mary was honored as “Mother of God” to preserve the Church from Christological heresies and to give her proper honor (cf. Romans 13:7), so also Mary must be venerated as “Co-Redemptrix” because this is what she always has been in becoming our spiritual mother at the Cross. The title necessarily will bring the heavenly aid which God wishes to give through his chosen vessel of Christ, the Woman of Revelation 12. Christ warned that those who are ashamed of him, he will be ashamed of before his heavenly Father. How will Christ feel about us if we his true Church act ashamed of Christ’s mother and why he introduced her as “Full of Grace” (“κεχαριτωμένη” Luke 1:27)? He even reminded us she is the “Woman Clothed with the Sun” and thereby revealed her fullness of grace in Revelation 12:1. He gave her to be the new “Woman,” the new mother of redeemed humanity from the Cross and before he ascended into heaven. How many continued apparitions must she make to remind us of the truths already emphasized in Scripture?
Stop the False Ecumenism
Repressing the title “Co-Redemptrix” after its repeated use by Pius XI, and due to ecumenical fears and embarrassment, has refused the Virgin Mary the honor due her. Not cool. Compromising on Scripture in the New Testament is not really ecumenical. It has repressed the Apostolic Faith that always presented her as the New Eve and the explanation Saint Irenaeus attached to her as New Eve (and cited in the “Dogmatic Constitution on the Church,” LG #56). It has allowed in the worldly spirit of false compromise by denying her an honor that was ordinary and even resumed in use by John Paul the Great during his papacy.
The embarrassment over the title is as silly and ridiculous as Nestorius’ embarrassment over “Mother of God.” Nestorius was afraid people would mistake the title “Mother of God” for thinking Mary gave Christ his divinity or that she was some kind of goddess before her earthly existence. The Catholic faithful had never used the title that way and Nestorius’ sudden fears were rightly condemned at Ephesus. Vatican II already gave the theology that explains the title Co-Redemptrix in Lumen Gentium #56-58 and that Mary is only a creature who does what she does through, with and in Jesus (subordinate to his natural divinity and grace). So why do we still suppress the title? The proper context is established in a Dogmatic Constitution so the title cannot be misundersood. Are we going to show the hermeneutic of continuity from what came before and during the Council, or will we downplay what heaven has made obvious?
Every Catholic theologian knows that Vatican II avoided using the title “Co-Redemptrix” purely for ecumenical reasons and even though the title has been implicit in “New Eve” since the Apostles. “Co-Redemptrix” was repeatedly used by Pius XI before the Council and John Paul the Great frequently applied it afterwards. German bishops – overly focused on ecumenical concerns – wanted John Paul to stop. After two-thousand years of the mystery of the kingdom of God on earth, what was implicit in “Scripture in the Tradition” has become more manifest as the Church lives through every era. Time has clearly made explicit what was always implicit. As testified to by the Holy Spirit – and Mary’s many apparitions and intercessions to save us from chastisement – the Church needs Mary’s aid to persevere in holding firmly to Jesus Christ and to persevere in Mary’s pure faith as the true virginal bride of Christ. She is the new pillar of fire leading the pilgrim Church on its Exodus. She is the Woman of Revelation 12.
That Mary is “Co-Redemptrix” – as understood in Lumen Gentium #56 to #58 – was further expressed by Pope Saint Paul VI in 1968. Pope Saint Paul VI expressed Mary’s cooperation in the redemption succinctly in his Credo of the People of God #14-15. This is an authentic “Profession of Faith” which he gave to the Church in an authoritative motu propio:
We believe that Mary is the Mother, who remained ever a Virgin, of the Incarnate Word, our God and Savior Jesus Christ, and that by reason of this singular election, she was, in consideration of the merits of her Son, redeemed in a more eminent manner, preserved from all stain of original sin and filled with the gift of grace more than all other creatures.
Joined by a close and indissoluble bond to the Mysteries of the Incarnation and Redemption, the Blessed Virgin, the Immaculate, was at the end of her earthly life raised body and soul to heavenly glory and likened to her risen Son in anticipation of the future lot of all the just; and we believe that the Blessed Mother of God, the New Eve, Mother of the Church, continues in heaven her maternal role with regard to Christ's members, cooperating with the birth and growth of divine life in the souls of the redeemed. [bold mine]
The failure to consolidate this understanding with the title “Co-Redemptrix” – a title repeatedly acknowledged before the Council and by John Paul the Great after the Council – would not be so sad had it at least continued to be recommended by Benedict XVI and Pope Francis.
The Warning of Our Lady in Akita and Spiritual Civil War in the Church
This all leads to the signs of the times. Our Lady has been manifesting the help which heaven wishes to give to the Church on earth if we will open ourselves to her Immaculate and Motherly Heart. Since the early-19th Century, the back of the Miraculous Medal shows Mary at the foot of the Cross obtaining the graces she shares here and now from heaven and as depicted on the front of the medal. The image of the two hearts at the bottom of the Miraculous Medal was resumed at Fatima in the early 20th Century when Jesus asked that devotion to the Immaculate Heart be kept with his Sacred Heart and tied it to the mystery at Calvary especially at the apparition at the Chapel of Tuy. Clearly Lumen Gentium and the “Credo of the People of God” reiterated that Mary’s role in the Redemption was always part of the ordinary magisterium of the Church. The prior apparitions and Medal only reminded us of Scripture in the Tradition. Nevertheless, some of Mary’s bishops on earth keep letting the false teachings of non-Apostolic Christians and false ecumenism get in the way of properly expressing and accepting Mary’s role as the New Eve.
Repeatedly, the Lord Jesus Christ has asked that the Church on earth accept the help of “the Woman Clothed with the Sun” (cf. Rev 12:1), whom the Church has always called the New Eve. How can we accept what we will no longer publicly acknowledge and which we even suppress since the Second Vatican Council? Why did we highlight the Virgin Mary’s compassion at the redemption in Lumen Gentium, clarify it further in the “Credo of the People of God,” and then follow the spirit of compromise and flee from admitting Mary is truly the Co-Redemptrix? Have we inherited an ethos of compromise that has existed since the Second Vatican Council and which was warned about in the powerful apparitions of the Virgin Mary in Akita, Japan?
In 1973, in a series of apparitions and messages which were approved by the same local bishop of that time, Bishop John Ito in 1984, the Virgin Mary warned on October 13, 1973 (the anniversary of the great sign given at Fatima):
As I told you, if men do not repent and better themselves, the Father will inflict a terrible punishment on all humanity. It will be a punishment greater than the deluge, such as one [has] never seen before. Fire will fall from the sky and will wipe out a great part of humanity, the good as well as the bad, sparing neither priests nor faithful. The survivors will find themselves so desolate that they will envy the dead. The only arms which will remain for you will be the Rosary and the Sign left by My Son. Each day recite the prayers of the Rosary. With the Rosary, pray for the Pope, the bishops and priests.
The work of the devil will infiltrate even into the Church in such a way that one will see cardinals opposing cardinals, bishops against bishops. The priests who venerate me will be scorned and opposed by their confreres...churches and altars sacked; the Church will be full of those who accept compromises and the demon will press many priests and consecrated souls to leave the service of the Lord.
The demon will be especially implacable against souls consecrated to God. The thought of the loss of so many souls is the cause of my sadness. If sins increase in number and gravity, there will be no longer pardon for them…
I have highlighted and made bold the above which is most relevant to this essay. Why would priests who venerate Mary be scorned by their confreres when this was unheard of in orthodoxy ever since the first Seven Ecumenical Councils? Why would veneration of Mary lead to churches and altars being sacked? Clearly something orthodox would have to be denied to Mary’s honor for such a persecution of those who venerate Mary. Notice the order of expression: loss of the veneration to Mary is followed by churches and altars being sacked and a spirit of compromise entering the Church and then the loss of faith. We were being warned on how Mariology affects Christology and Ecclesiology (and the liturgies). Just as revelatory, the specific statue of Mary – which was central to the apparitions in Akita Japan and wept tears 101 times – was expressly tied to encouraging the title “Co-Redemptrix.”
When devotion to Mary is popularly misunderstood, faith in Christ is weakened (because she is the guardian of the Incarnation) and the liturgy is not rightly entered (because she is the archetype of the Church as Virginal Mother and Spouse). The title “Co-Redemptrix” specifically acknowledges a synthesis of the Virgin Mary’s subordinate assistance to Christ at Calvary and his Sacrifice upon the Cross and her continued intercession by the Holy Spirit (as explained in Lumen Gentium). As member of the redeemed, through Christ’s foreseen merits, Mary was present and the first to assist Christ through the Holy Spirit at what is made present again at every Sacrifice of the Mass, the grace of Calvary which is poured out upon the world.
The depiction on the Miraculous Medal and dispensation of graces was a reminder of her presence amongst us in the liturgies when Calvary is made present. She joins us in prayer and wants to help us enter Mass in imitation of her faith and devotion at Calvary and share in its fruit. Her prayers help us to live as disciples and make us her offspring since she is the original model of being a member of Christ. Without her and her motherhood, we could not be members of Christ. It is acceptance of this motherly love for her Son Jesus Christ and his Body which we should open ourselves to by explicitly acknowledging Mary and accepting her motherly role; of her gathering with us in worship of her Son and her interceding for us from Heaven per the Credo of Paul VI.
By spreading false opinion in the media that Vatican II had minimalized honor to the Virgin Mary, the serpent struck at the Woman’s heel. It struck on the heels of the ecumenical council and did everything it could to prevent veneration of Mary from being properly implemented and accepted. The devil didn't want its head crushed and tried drowning the Woman in lies (cf. Rev 12:15). John Paul II had almost completed the proper implementation of the Council, but he left one serious dogmatic facet untied: the title “Co-Redemptrix” was not fully promulgated beyond speeches and audiences and is being suppressed. When we see Cardinal against Cardinal today, perhaps we need to turn to Our Lady for help inside the Church and venerate her properly so as to enter her devotion to Christ which is the image of the true Church.
Mary, Archetype of the Church
The Church is at a crossroads and the title “Co-Redemptrix” has the power to re-consolidate what has been suppressed from the tradition and the faith which draws Christ closer to us and magnifies the Lord. A title can do all that? Well, didn’t consecration of the world to the Immaculate Heart bring down the Iron Curtain as promised, even though we suffer the effects of it being done late? “Co-Redemptrix” synthesizes and re-establishes the nexus of Christology (affirming Christ is God) and Ecclesiology (the Church as Virginal Bride of Christ and nourished from Calvary). It is hoped that Pope Francis will re-appropriate the true meaning of Lumen Gentium #56-58 by re-promulgating the title “Co-Redemptrix” – which was so frequently used by Pius XI and John Paul the Great – by making it the permanent language of the Church to honor Mary’s subordinate but unique role at Calvary and her on-going intercession from heaven per the Credo of Paul VI.
The Miraculous Medal promised graces to those who wear it, the Church supports its promotion, and the Medal is symbolic of Mary as Co-Redemptrix. Our Lady of Fatima established graces for those practicing First Saturday devotions and her role as Co-Redemptrix was clearly shown at the vision of Tuy in 1929. For these reasons, Sister Lucia the visionary of Fatima advocated at the end of her life for the title Co-Redemptrix to be more officially promulgated but she and John Paul the Great died before seeing it happen. Considering the Miraculous Medal and First Saturdays are devotions left to individuals, how much more so will the Church find strength and help by a more universal affirmation such as promulgation of Mary’s rightful title on the lips of her offspring. The title directs the faith of individuals to acceptance of her maternity over them, not just as the Mother of God but also as their loving Mother.
Re-affirmation of the title Co-Redemptrix would bind more closely the truths of Christ’s identity and mission (Christology) and the truth of the Church’s image in Mary (Ecclesiology) more deeply in our own personal faith. Like Mary, we are the people at the service of God and not our own egos: “Be it done unto me according to [God’s will]”. Like Mary, we live from the will of God and its full embrace. Like Mary, we are the spotless bride by Christ’s grace and not our own. Like Mary, it is from Christ’s sacrifice that we have received all grace and from which our truest identity is realized. Like Mary, it is Christ who empowers us to cooperate in the redemption and do the works that he does: “he who believes in me will also do the works that I do; and greater works than these will he do, because I go to the Father” (John 14:12). Only by developing in Mary’s faith is devotion to Christ properly exercised and the Sacrifice of Christ properly participated.
Like wearing the Miraculous Medal, honoring Mary with the title “Co-Redemptrix” will obtain Christ’s light for us to be freed from personal sin and the current cultural Marxism under which Christians plead to God for deliverance. The Marian age and the Woman clothed with the sun is helping her offspring triumph over the serpent through Jesus. Mary is the God-bearer, Theotokos, and she brings God to us.
Pope Francis wishes to be buried at Saint Mary Major, the place of greatest honor and veneration of the Virgin Mary in Rome and throughout the world. May he merit the honor as an offspring of “the Woman” who crushes the serpent’s head by binding the Church closer to Jesus and Mary. Mary was made the “Mother of God,” Theotokos, to continue in service as Christ’s handmaid and “Co-Redemptrix.” She is the New Eve in the service of the New Adam.
For a previous article on Mary as Co-Redemptrix, see: