All the Church"s feast days in honour of the Blessed Virgin Mary, the Mother of Jesus, find their origin in the revelation of Scripture even though the actual title of some of them may not be found as such within the text of the New Testament.

Two passages in particular provide the foundation of our feast days and of all our devotion to Mary. The first passage is, of course, the Annunciation, where God, through the ministry of the angel Gabriel, invited Mary to assume the role of the Mother of the Messiah, Jesus the Son of God. If God so honoured Mary, it is a grave fault and one close to blasphemy on the part of any human being , especially any one who claims to be a Christian, to refuse to offer Mary the honour and praise she deserves.

The second passage is in Jn 19, when Jesus on the Cross gave his own Mother Mary to be our mother, the mother of the Church. Again to refuse a gift that Jesus, our Lord and Saviour, proclaimed from the Cross is to forfeit an almost incredible divine gift.