"In summary, the pope made five points about Mary in Sardinia, which are likely to surface again while he’s at Lourdes:
• Mary points to Christ, above all to his incarnation.
• Mary is a symbol of the beauty and tenderness of God.
• Mary is a forerunner and a model for all disciples of Christ.
• Mary is a model for mothers, children and spouses, and thus a patron of the family.
• Mary is the “star of the new evangelization,” a patron for efforts to bring Christ to the world.
Benedict encouraged the Sardinians to renew their Marian traditions, not merely as a matter of preserving local culture, but also because of the importance of Mary in Catholic theology and spirituality.
“The role of Mary in salvation history stands out in all its clarity: the being of Mary is totally relative to Christ, in particular to his incarnation,” Benedict said in his homily at the sanctuary of Our Lady of Bonaria. “Respecting everything human, God makes it fecund from within, causing the most beautiful fruit of his creative and redemptive work to bloom from the humble virgin of Nazareth.”
“Thus we can, once again, contemplate the place of Mary in God’s plan for salvation,” the pope said. “She is, in fact, in Christ, the summit and model of ‘those who love God.’ In the ‘here I 
am’ of the Son, we find a faithful echo of the ‘here I am’ of his mother, as well as the ‘here I am’ of all the adoptive children of the Son.”"
Father of Mercy, give your people help and strength from heaven.
The birth of the Virgin Mary's son
was the dawn of our salvation.
May this celebration of her birthday
bring us closer to lasting peace.
Grant this through Our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son,
who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit,
one God, forever and ever. Amen.
-- the Liturgy of the Hours
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