Vatican City, May 9, 2010 / 08:10 am
After noting the arrival of spring, the Holy Father remarked before Sunday's Regina Coeli that May is the Month of Mary. He spoke of her as the Mother and model of the Church, "the perfect disciple of Jesus."
The Pope was joined by thousands in St. Peter's Square for the recitation of the Marian prayer on a sunny and clear spring day.
Explaining that for the Liturgy, May always falls within the Easter season, he said, it is "the time of 'alleluia,' of the waking of the mystery of Christ in the light of the Resurrection and of the Paschal faith. It is the time of waiting for the Holy Spirit, that came down powerfully on the nascent Church at Pentecost."
Thus, continued the Pope, the natural and liturgical contexts go together well with the Church's tradition of dedicating the month of May to Mary, the "most beautiful flower" of creation, a "rose" through whom God, in sending his Son, donated "a new spring" to the world.