Dec 23, 2016
by MOSAIC Editorial Team
Here is a little-known fact: Mary Immaculate is the patron saint of Sacred Heart Major Seminary, and the Feast of the Immaculate Conception, December 8, is the seminary's patronal feast day. As such, it has been a long-standing tradition for the archbishop of Detroit to celebrate this great feast day with his seminarians.
The custom continued this past December 8, when Most Rev. Allen Vigneron met with Sacred Heart's seminarians for a spiritual conference in the morning. Afterward, he was the main celebrant and homilist at a 10:00 AM solemn Mass in the main chapel. Archbishop Vigneron then joined the men for a luncheon in the seminary gymnasium, joined by Sacred Heart's faculty and staff.
On first thought, it seems more fitting that the Feast of the Sacred Heart of Jesus would be Sacred Heart's great day of celebration. But back in the early years of the seminary, the seminary's leadership chose another commemorative day, and the reason was practical. A suitable liturgical celebration could not be conducted since, by the date of the feast day, which falls around early June, the seminarians would have dispersed for the summer.
The Feast of the Immaculate Conception was thereby chosen as Sacred Heart's patronal feast day. There is a special rightness to the choice. How could a seminarian go wrong by honoring Mary's purityher being conceived without Original Sinand by acknowledging her intercessory role in the life of every seminarian as Mediatrix of All Graces?
Pray for us, O holy Mother of God, that we may become worthy of the promises of Christ.
MOSAIC Editorial Team