For centuries the litanies to Mary have praised her as "Queen"

The memorial feast of the "Queenship of Mary" was instituted in the wake of the Assumption, Pope Benedict XVI once recalled during his Wednesday catechesis: two feasts, one mystery. The feast of the Queenship of Mary is in fact celebrated on August 22nd by the Latin Catholic Church, eight days after the feast of the Assumption.

The Queenship of Mary is inscribed in the liturgical calendar as a "obligatory memorial." It was on the feast of the Divine Motherhood of the Blessed Virgin, October 11, 1954, that Pope Pius XII proclaimed in his encyclical Ad Caeli Reginam, the institution of the feast concerning her blessed royalty. For centuries the litanies have sung the praises of Mary, "Queen of Angels, ... Queen of Patriarchs, ... Queen of Apostles."

"The recognition of the royalty of the Blessed Virgin is a necessary consequence of the mission to which she was predestined by God," wrote French Catholic author and theologian Fr Dominique Le Tourneau.

The Marie de Nazareth editorial team