66 live in Him and for Him: “The life I live now is not my own; Christ is living in me” (Gal 2:20). God’s gift of the Immaculate Conception should be perceived not as a static, restricted gift, given only at the beginning of Mary’s life, but rather as a dynamic one which embraces all of Her life. Thus, for Mary, her Immaculate Conception is not the end of her salvation, but the beginning, opening the way to fulfi llment in eternity. Therefore, we perceive this gift as a task which Mary fulfi lls in Her co-participation with Christ in the work of salvation. Each grace is the beginning of the road we have to take. It is a task which God entrusts to us. We discover here a call for a dynamic experiencing our bond with God, which is zealously striving for holiness. The ability to accept God’s gifts with responsibility, and to rejoice in them in a spirit of thankfulness is a sign of the spiritual life inspired by the mystery of the Immaculate Conception. The Immaculate Conception as a Sign of God’s Love The Marian as a Man Who Is Loved and Who Loves Thanks to the exceptional gift of the Immaculate Conception, Mary experiences the power of God’s love in a unique way, since she participates most fully in the intimate life of God the Father, Son and Holy Spirit. Mary, full of grace appears to be “particularly beloved by God—completely pervaded with His love, grounded in it completely, as if entirely formed by it: the highest love of God.”10 Mary “completely pervaded with the love” of God becomes “a perfect refl ection of God’s image,” yet—to be more precise—“not by nature as is the case with her Son (cf. Col 1:15), but as “the servant of the Lord” (Lk 1:38) by the power of grace.”11 Endowed with the fullness of God’s love, from the fi rst instant of her conception, Mary becomes the witness to the mystery of God’s love, His selfl essness with which He “chose” each man before the creation of the world, and the sanctity which He wants to bestow upon him. This experience of God’s love which we contemplate in the mystery of the Immaculate Conception has great signifi cance for our spiritual lives as well as for our apostolate. 10 John Paul II, Salus Populi Romani, Homily delivered at the Basilica of Santa Maria Maggiore, December 8, 1980, in: Jan Paweł II o Matce Bożej [John Paul II about the Mother of God], vol. 2, Warsaw 1998, p. 125. 11 Jan Paweł II, Matka Zbawiciela [Mother of the Redeemer], Letter to the participants of the theological symposium devoted to the Encyclical Letter Redemptoris Mater, May 22, 1988, in op.cit., vol. 3, p. 58.
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