/ by Edward Mullany

To refer to her by her simple name of Mary, for instance, as the writers of the Gospels do, seems to me to emphasize her ordinariness, her humbleness, and her familiarity to us, while to refer to her as the ‘Virgin Mary’ is to emphasize her sanctity and purity (and perhaps even the paradoxical or miraculous consequences with which she is associated, in terms of the Incarnation).