This flower for our Lady on her birthday is not from Holy Souls Mountain, but was, instead, supplied to me in .tiff form, which I put up as a jpeg (smaller), and this, all the way from Australia, from C.W. Thanks, C.W., for that gift to the Blessed Virgin on her Birthday.
And it is her birthday, unless you rebel against the liturgical calendar of the Roman Catholic Church as do Medjugorjites, who now and again check in on the blog to see in any more comments were made to the this post.
Imagine, Jesus’ mom using an apparition of hers to cause division in the Church, a rejection of the liturgical calendar so integral to the life of the faithful. Or, well then, maybe she didn’t appear there to do that.
While some might say that the calendar is merely discipline and can be changed, so, whatever, it’s no big deal, instead… instead… the calendar precisely as discipline is extremely important to the unity of the Church. It must be respected, not despised.
This is precisely the kind of contention agaisnt the Church which Saint Paul condemns in no uncertain terms. It is better to be simple children of the Church, not those who arbitrarily undermine this and then that and then the other thing. So, having said that, we have the joy this very day of exclaiming:
Happy Birthday to you, O Most Blessed Virgin Mary!!!
Accompany me, Father George David Byers, S.S.L., S.T.D., as I begin life as a Catholic Priest-Hermit by choice. Holy Souls Hermitage is dedicated to the sanctification of my fellow priests, bishops, deacons & seminarians going through the purgatory of this life or the next. Prayer and sacrifice go up, of course, for both Benedict XVI and the next Successor of Saint Peter. 
YES, HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO OUR HEAVENLY MOTHER!
Just a side note…if the calendar is ever changed, it is certainly not up to some so-called seer, or what they say they see, to change it. Not their “job” description.
Thank you Father for writing about this confusion.
It is already Sunday morning here in Uganda, and Mother Mary’s birthday was yesterday. As I was reading a lot on the internet, I found a page from Medjugorje that said Mary’s birthday was 5th August. It was talking about some visionaries also. I did not know about that claim before, may be because I have had no interest in reading much about Medjugorje due to the controversies that surround it.
When I later went for morning Mass at my parish, the priest cautioned us about this false claim. And just like you have said Father, our Mother Mary cannot appear to bring division in her Church.
Here is a post I published yesterday.
http://ugandayouthministryassociation.wordpress.com/2012/09/08/your-birth-o-virgin-mother-of-god-heralded-joy-to-all-the-world/
What a beautiful picture. I LOVE zinnias. They come in various sizes and bloom for many months. I just wish they were perennials and not annuals. I have to sow fresh seeds every year. They never fail to bring a smile to my face and I’m sure that our Mama Mary was happy to see you praise her with this flower.