O Holy Virgin [SATB]

The Blessed Virgin Mary is honored in Christian communities as the Theotokos, “the bearer of God”, carrying within her finite womb the infinite Christ. She is honored as first among the Saints, the first Christian. She is the recipient and earthly stewardess of God’s Son, the incarnate Jesus Christ.

The provenance of this prayer “O Holy Virgin” is not entirely certain, but it is among the daily prayers in the St. Ambrose Prayerbook, and was most likely included among other non-liturgical devotional prayers that were circulating at the time of the compilation of the prayerbook. It is also unclear that this prayer comes from any particular rite, and may have simply been composed out of someone’s personal piety and committed to paper for continued use in daily devotion and prayer.

Most likely written originally in Latin, this setting uses an English translation. Relatively brief and simply set, this musical setting is intended to be like its spoken ancestor, a call for intercession from the Blessed Virgin Mary to pray and advocate for all souls before her Son, Jesus Christ.