Une Minute avec Marie
Faire connaître et aimer Marie
The episode of the Presentation of the Virgin Mary in the Temple is not in the four Gospels, but in an apocryphal book, the “Infancy Gospel of James.” Popular piety and Marian spirituality were influenced by it, because it stressed Our Lady’s openness to divine will. Both in the East and in the West, this feast has been very popular.
Mary was predestined to become the living temple of God. The scene is simple, according to this apocryphal Gospel—Anne and Joachim wanted to thank God for the birth their child. They chose to consecrate Mary. When she was three years old, Mary was taken to the Temple, where a priest greeted her as she sat on the steps of the altar with words that resemble those of the Magnificat - "All the people of Israel loved her." This feast day is attested to since the sixth century.