Why is Mary Our Queen?

Giving honor to the Blessed Virgin Mary is controversial among Protestant Christians (Catholics and even Orthodox have, of course, always done it); this article does not attempt to justify it exhaustively, though a little discussion of it is unavoidable. More pertinently, though, the Confraternity of Christ the King specifically honors the Blessed Virgin Mary as Queen, just as it honors Christ as King. So what is the justification for this? Why is Mary our Queen?

The CCR holds that properly honoring Christ as King must be accompanied by properly honoring Mary as Queen. Dishonoring His Mother, or denying her queenship, would be dishonoring Him and denying His Kingship, which is obviously unacceptable for us. But why is this the case?

Christians have always honored Mary, and most fundamentally this is for one simple reason: we honor Mary because Christ honored her. The Christian is first and foremost a follower of Christ; we love what He loves, we hate what He hates, we live our lives as He lives His life. Yet no one could possibly have honored Mary more than Christ Himself did. Any good son loves and honors his mother; and who would dare say that Christ is not a good son?

Nor is Christ's veneration of His Mother mere speculation; the Scriptures makes it explicit. Indeed, let us look at the Finding in the Temple for a specific example. Christ, the Son of the Living God, the Second Person of the Blessed Trinity, put Himself under the rule of the Blessed Virgin Mary:

And he went down with them, and came to Nazareth, and was subject to them. Luke 2:51 (emphasis added)

It is very hard to overemphasize how much this means. Christ, He Who created Mary and all other things, was subject to the one whom He created. And it's almost more amazing when taken the other way around: Mary, created by Christ, gave birth to the One Who made her. This is beyond mind-blowing; it's a mystery of God's Providence that could occupy the mind for eternity, and indeed will do so should we be blessed enough to enter Heaven.

Even during the most agonizing moments of His suffering on the Cross, Christ took time to give honor and care to His mother, who remained with Him the whole time at the foot of the Cross. On the Cross, even breathing is an excruciating agony, so we must take His Words from the Cross with even more serious contemplation than all His others. And yet, on the Cross, He spoke and told his mother, “Woman, behold thy son”; and then to the apostle John, “Behold thy mother.” If Christ offers her this honor at this, of all times, how can we not offer her honor in other times?

So honoring Mary is fundamental to Christianity; but what about honoring her specifically as queen?

The Catechism of Christ the King addresses this, briefly, in questions 45–50. We honor Mary as Queen for three reasons: first, from her motherhood of God; second, from the laws of the Jews; and third, from the simple perfection of her person.

First, her motherhood of God. Our Lady has done an incomparable service to mankind: she willingly played her vital, indeed indispensable, part in the grand plan for the salvation of us all. Without her, Christ is not born, and thus does not suffer and die for us. It is true, of course, that Christ might have chosen any number of means to save us; the fact is, however, that He chose this means, and that Mary's cooperation was a vital part of that.

Indeed, just as Christ stands as the new Adam, and as such is entitled to royal honors as the progenitor of the entire line of the redeemed, Mary stands as the new Eve, the Mother of all the Faithful just as the old Eve is the mother of all the living. Her role here is absolutely indispensable, and one which we cannot do without. This role renders her rightfully the queen under two of the same titles that establishes Christ as king: the right of creation (albeit in the new creation of Christ, not the creation from nothing in the beginning), and the right of redemption. It is, of course, true that Mary's role in our creation and our redemption is entirely subordinate to Christ's, and cannot be accomplished without Christ; however, her role is unique and indispensable given the means of salvation by which Christ has chosen to deliver the world, and no Christian can possibly ignore this.

We owe Our Lady incomparable thanks; the immense service she has done for all of us, and indeed continues to do for us through her intercession before the throne of her Son in Heaven, entitles her to the honor of queenship.

Second, from the laws of the Jews. It is indisputable that the Hebrews, and later the Jews, considered the mother of the king to be an extremely important figure. King Solomon even “boweed to” his mother, and “a throne was set for the king's mother, and she sat on his right hand,” and when she said she had something to ask him, Solomon answered, “My mother, ask: for I must not turn away thy face” 1 Kings 2:19–20. An entire chapter of Proverbs details the great service that a queen mother provides to the king Prov 31.

This is a pattern that clearly extends throughout the kingdom of David (the very kingdom of which Christ is King!). The “Becoming Catholic” series at Eternal Christendom pretty conclusively traces this out; listeners are encouraged to go there for further information.

Finally, from the perfection of her person. It is impossible to deny that being the Mother of God, bearing the Creator of the universe in her womb and carrying Him for nine months, then raising Him to adulthood as His dearest mother, makes her closer to Christ her Son than any other human being possibly could be. This intimate connection to her Son, the universal King, and her absolutely sinless life, entitles her to be honored as queen much as Christ's absolutely sinless (though, of course, incomparably higher) life entitles Him to be honored as King: she is, in this way, like an exemplar for us, the best of our breed, and thus the queen of it.

Christians have always honored Mary in this way, and Our Lady Mary has never failed to return this honor to her Son. Christ's very first miracle, at the wedding feast at Cana, shows us the kind of honor that Christ has for His dear mother:

And the wine failing, the mother of Jesus said to him: They have no wine. And Jesus saith to her: Woman, what is that to me and to thee? my hour is not yet come. His mother saith to the waiters: Whatsoever he shall say to you, do ye. John 2:3–5

In other words, Christ began His entire public ministry, indeed, worked His first public miracle, solely because His mother asked Him to. Mary's intercession was not wasted; indeed, it cannot be wasted, for like Solomon, Christ cannot turn away His mother's face.

In post-Scriptural times, Christians have repeatedly relied on Mary's intercession. When the Vikings besieged Paris in 911, the people of the city begged the Virgin for her prayers, using the “sancta camisa” as their banner, and they were able to resist the attack. At Lepanto, Pope St. Pius V asked all Christendom to pray the Rosary for Our Lady's intercession on behalf of a massively outnumbered and outpowered Christian fleet against the Turks; her deliverance of victory to that fleet became the feast of Our Lady of the Rosary, and gave rise to her title of Our Lady of Victory. At Vienna, the victorious Christian armies, triumphing against all odds against the Turkish invaders, beseeched Our Lady to intercede for them in the Holy Name of Mary; their victory gave rise to the feast of that Holy Name. Examples can be multiplied endlessly.

The Confraternity of Christ the King thus honors its King's wishes by giving queenly honor to His Mother, the Mother of God, our Queen. We do so in a number of ways.

First, our symbology gives honor to our Queen by using the color blue in her honor. While our primary symbols are dedicated entirely to Christ the King, the vexilla and the full arms, along with the rostripetasus and sagum, have blue, which is Mary's own color, in sign of our homage to her.

Second, we honor her in our praying of the Rosary. When a Confraternity member prays the Rosary, he kneels during the Crowning of Thorns and the Crucifixion; the latter as any Christian should, in honor of the suffering which produced his salvation, and the former as a special honor to Christ the King, the mockery of Whose Kingship has become His Crown. But he also kneels during the fifth glorious mystery, the Crowning of Mary as Queen of Heaven and Earth. This is a special honor to her as queen.

Lastly, the Confraternity keeps many of the feasts celebrating Our Lady's queenship as special feasts of Christ the King. For example, we keep 7 October, the feast of the Holy Rosary; 12 September, the feast of the Holy Name of Mary; and especially 31 May, the feast of the Queenship of the Blessed Virgin Mary. By keeping these feasts especially, we can give her the queenly honor that is her right, and by so doing give Christ the kingly honor that He deserves.

And so, to sum up: Mary is Queen because Christ is King. Failing to honor our queen is failing to honor Him.

Christus vincit! Christus regnat! Christus imperat!