You have heard that it was said that Mary under the title Mother of the Church was “first taught by Saint Ambrose in the fourth century.” No. It was first taught in Genesis 3:15.20, the whole “her Seed” thing.
Adam, now dumbed down by original sin, dangerous in his lust for self-salvation — that being the reason why Adam is blocked by the Cherubim with flaming sword from reaching out and grabbing the fruit of the Tree of the Living Ones (as he will only hurt himself) — it’s that fallen Adam in Genesis 3:20 who maliciously calls his wife חַוָּ֑ה, that is KHavvah, which, because of a purposed wordplay through the centuries, we transcribe as “Eve” or “Eva”. If you put “Eva” in reverse, you have “Ave” in reference to Mary, Mother of the Redeemer.
While this Eva/Ave wordplay is a compliment for Mary in support for her Immaculate Conception, this is, of course, at the same time, an insult, correctly given, to the wife of Adam. “Eve” or “Eva” was never meant to be taken as academic linguistic historical philological commentary, but merely as an entirely correct doctrinal commentary.
Another such wordplay of the Church Fathers having nothing to do with text but which is a brilliant catechetical mnemonic, is the whole apple tree and bite out of the apple thing. In Latin, “malum” means evil. But, in Latin, “malum” also means both apple tree and apple. Hence, the whole apple imagery regardless of that particular wordplay not being in the Hebrew. But it’s clever. I like it.
There are exhilaratingly brilliant original language Hebrew word plays throughout the text. For instance, a word with two entirely different meanings is Serpent which is equally (an angelic and now fallen) Oracle.
So, back to the Entire Living One. The Redeemer is Himself the Church. The Church is the Entire Living One. The Holy Spirit brings us together through, with, and in Jesus to our Heavenly Father, making of us, in Jesus, members of the Entire Living One. The best way to understand the phrase “Mother of the Entire Living One” is with Saint Paul’s description of Jesus as the Body of Christ, with Jesus as the Head of the Body and we as members of the Body. Pius XII’s encyclical Mystici Corporis Christi (Mystical Body of Christ) speaks of this Body of Christ. Saint Bernard said that Mary did not give birth to a monster, the head of the body alone, but rather to the whole Christ, head and members. She is also our good mother by her increased birth pangs of intercession for us under the Cross, even as our sins ripped her Son to shreds, to death, tortured to death, on the Cross. She, the Immaculate Conception, is the Mother of the Entire Living One, the entire Body of Christ.
Perhaps people, exegetes, are most afraid to actually do up a bit of historical philology because they’re going to come up with the conclusion that when Jesus lays down His life for us, because we are one with Him, He will also be laying down our lives with His. There is no greater love than this, He says. He gives us the opportunity to put this love into action by having us united with Himself, the Entire Living One.
To say it again, what Adam calls his wife, חַוָּ֑ה, literally means “Mother of the Entire Living One.” It cannot mean Mother of all the living. She has not and does not physically give birth to the trillions of individuals who have inhabited the face of the earth. Nor can חַוָּ֑ה have anything to do with that which is living, as she is the mother of all who are dying since their conception, dying both physically and forever spiritually unless Redemption and Salvation intervenes, unless we become one with the Entire Living One. That would come by way not of Adam’s wife, but the Mother of the Redeemer, who, in Genesis 3:15, is manifestly future not only to Adam’s wife, but to the hagiographer. It is Jesus who redeems us, who saves us, who is the Entire Living One, but The Woman (Genesis 3:15, Cana, Calvary, the Great Sign appearing in the heavens described in the Apocalypse…) is the Mother of the Entire Living One, Mother of the Church.
On November 21, 1964, at the conclusion of the Second Vatican Council’s third session, the day of the solemn promulgation of the Dogmatic Constitution on the Church, Lumen Gentium, Pope Paul VI stood up to pronounce the title of Mary, “Mother of the Church.” The decision had been made not to honor Mary with an entire document all on her own (to the consternation of some “conservatives”), but “merely” as some had wished, to include her only by way of an appended chapter in the Constitution on the Church.
Instead, how this worked out is that it was finally understood that a separate document honoring Mary was instead misguided piety in that a separate document would actually be dismissive of Mary, a separate her from the Church and then dismiss her kind of thing. Keeping her integral with the Church is not to make her disappear in the midst of the Church, but to see her as she is, that Great Woman, clothed with the sun, with the moon under her feet, crowned with twelve stars, the living Ark of the Covenant, the Great Sign appearing in Heaven.
Perhaps the truth hit home for the (Cardinal) (Arch)bishops at the Council at least a moment when Paul VI stood up to pronounce the words that Mary is Mother of the Church, Mater Ecclesiae. This was surely an occasion of grace which I very much respect.
If you’ve ever been involved in an extended standing ovation, you know that it is difficult to clap your hands for 30 seconds. Certainly by two minutes your metatarsals are sore, feeling like they are breaking. There are varying accounts, but all of them describing thunderous applause, a standing ovation by all present, for well over ten minutes, something like 14 minutes, some say longer, by far the most emotional moment of the entire Council. Emotions are God-given, but are now fallen with the rest of human nature. Reason, by way of grace, must coldly rule over the emotions. We must ensure that we are not lost by way of emotion to sycophantic political correctness such as one might find in a standing ovation.
Humble thanksgiving to Jesus for His forgiveness of our sin at the intercession of Mary, the Mother of the Entire Living One, is the only Way to go.
This title of Mary, Mother of the Church, has now been inserted in the General Roman Liturgical Calendar (Novus Ordo) for the 20th May, which this year appropriately fell the day after Pentecost. Priests who have the Votive Mass approved in 1973 and inserted into the Missale Romanum, editio typica altera will have to take care as the years go by to use only the prayers proper to the feast, but not the rest of the Mass texts in that “alternate Missal”, for instance, the consecrations, which in that older edition incorrectly use “for all” instead of the true translation of “for many.”
The title “Mother of the Church” was added to the Litany of Loreto in 1980.
From the Address of Pope Saint Paul VI, at the conclusion of the third session of the Second Vatican Council (November 21, 1964: AAS 56 [1964], 1015-1016) —
- “Taking into consideration the close ties by which Mary and the Church are bound together, to the glory of the Blessed Virgin and for our consolation, We declare Mary Most Holy to be Mother of the Church, that is, of the whole Christian people, faithful and Pastors alike, who invoke her as their most loving Mother; and We establish that by this sweetest of names the whole Christian people should henceforth give still greater honor to the Mother of God and offer her their supplications.”
Priests will and have already condemned me for speaking in such fashion, mentioning Paul VI and the Second Vatican Council, having nothing themselves to say in praise of the Most Blessed Virgin Mary, the Immaculate Conception. I don’t care what anyone thinks about Paul VI or Vatican II. I do think that, whatever the bishops back in the day were up to, this occasion of the proclamation of Mary as Mother of the Church was, again, a significant occasion of grace, and continues to be, regardless of whether they or we took it that way or not. I’m all for occasions of grace in honor of Jesus and in praise of Mary.
Flowers for you, Mary, from out front of the rectory and the “Morris” rose out back:
- “But Father George! Father George! You’re a heretic! Everyone ever has called Adam’s wife Eve! What the hell is that matter with you! It’s like you’re Pope Francis changing the “Our Father” Father George! I’m sick of all this modernism of yours!”
So said the stealth modernist. Here’s the deal: Adam was as malicious as priests who have studied in Rome and say that no Pope is infallible but they, the student-priests, are, of course, infallible. Adam was as malicious as priests who have said in all their filthy sin that Mary is not immaculate, but everyone else is immaculate, meaning themselves, because, as they say, there is no sin anyway.
Scripture has it that Adam was subject to original sin and was not yet converted when he named his wife. He had made himself subject to Satan. And we’re going to trust him? That’s malicious.
We’re all with Adam at the time of his fallenness, at the time of his lust for self-salvation, unless, by the grace of God, we seriously repent from that, unless we are united with the Entire Living One, Divine Son of the Immaculate Conception. What Adam did in naming his wife Mother of the Entire Living One was a blasphemy against that Entire Living One. Jesus is the Son of Mary, not Adam’s wife.
Thank you, dearest dear Mary, for permitting wretched, wretched me to say something about you, for tolerating me giving you some of the flowers Jesus made for us to give to you.
ARISE! LET US BE GOING! 
Amen.