Just as many of us make a big deal about our birthdays, the birthday of Mary is an important day for Catholics. Nine months ago - on the feast of the Immaculate Conception (8 December), Mary was immaculately conceived in the womb of her mother. Her saintly parents, Saints Joachim and Anne brought her up and she became the woman through whom God gave the world Our Saviour and Lord, Jesus Christ.

Mary’s Nativity is one of the only three birthdays honoured in the Church’s liturgical calendar. The others are those of John the Baptist and, of course, the Nativity of Jesus at Christmas.

As we celebrate this important feast on 8 September, we share with you a prayer to honour Our Lady.

A prayer in honour of Mary’s Nativity

Vouchsafe that I may praise thee, O sacred Virgin;
give me strength against thine enemies,
and against the enemy of the whole human race.
Give me strength humbly to pray to thee.
Give me strength to praise thee in prayer with all my powers,
through the merits of thy most sacred nativity,
which for the entire Christian world was a birth of joy,
the hope and solace of its life.

When thou wast born,
O most holy Virgin,
then was the world made light.

Happy is thy stock, holy thy root,
and blessed thy fruit,
for thou alone as a virgin,
filled with the Holy Spirit,
didst merit to conceive thy God,
as a virgin to bear Thy God,
as a virgin to bring Him forth,
and after His birth to remain a virgin.

Have mercy therefore upon me a sinner,
and give me aid, O Lady,
so that just as thy nativity,
glorious from the seed of Abraham,
sprung from the tribe of Juda,
illustrious from the stock of David,
didst announce joy to the entire world,
so may it fill me with true joy
and cleanse me from every sin.

Pray for me, O Virgin most prudent,
that the gladsome joys of thy most helpful nativity
may put a cloak over all my sins.

O holy Mother of God,
flowering as the lily,
pray to thy sweet Son for me,
a wretched sinner.

Amen.

[St Anselm]