Interesting Fact About the Feast of the Immaculate Conception

Today at Mass during the homily our priest, Fr. Don, asked the congregation if any of us knew why this particular Feast, The Feast of the Immaculate Conception, is one of the few left that we have to go to Mass for no matter what day of the week it falls on. He then told us that it is because Our Lady of the Immaculate Conception happens to be our nation's patron saint, and therefore the bishops of America had to make sure we remembered that by requiring us to go to Mass for her... I learned something new.... :)

O pure and immaculate
and likewise blessed Virgin,
who art the sinless Mother of thy Son,
the mighty Lord of the universe,
thou who art inviolate and altogether holy,
the hope of the hopeless and sinful,
we sing thy praises.
We bless thee, as full of every grace,
thou who didst bear the God-Man:
we bow low before thee;
we invoke thee and implore thine aid.
Rescue us, O holy and inviolate Virgin,
from every necessity that presses upon us
and from all the temptations of the devil.

Be our intercessor and advocate
at the hour of death and judgment;
deliver us from the fire
that is not extinguished
and from the outer darkness;
make us worthy of the glory of thy Son,
O dearest and most clement Virgin Mother.
Thou indeed art our only hope most sure
and sacred in God's sight,
to Whom be honor and glory and majesty and dominion
for ever and ever world without end. Amen.