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December is a busy month and there are many special feast days that are part of popular culture.
These include the feast of St. Nicholas on December 6 and the feast of Our Lady of Guadalupe on December 12.
The USCCB website explains, "On October 7, 2019, Pope Francis ordered the inscription of Our Lady of Loreto into the General Roman Calendar. She is celebrated each year as an Optional Memorial on December 10."
Yet, it wasn't until May 29, 2023, for the English texts of the Mass to be approved and implemented in the United States.
The celebration remains optional, and so not every priest will choose to celebrate it, but the laity can still recall the story of Our Lady of Loreto on December 10.
Who is Our Lady of Loreto?
Bret Thoman describes the traditional story of Our Lady of Loreto in an article for Aleteia:
So, how did the walls get to Loreto? For many centuries, tradition held that angels miraculously carried the Holy House from Nazareth to Loreto. Throughout the basilica are numerous artistic depictions of angels flying over the seas with the house. For this reason, at the request of pilots returning home after World War I, Pope Benedict XV declared Our Lady of Loreto as the patroness of pilots and airmen on March 24, 1920.
Cardinal Arthur Rocke explained why Pope Francis chose to elevate this unique feast to the universal Church:
This shrine recalls the mystery of the Incarnation, leading all those who visit it to consider “the fullness of time”, when God sent his Son, born of a woman, as well as to meditate both on the words of the Angel announcing the Good News and on the words of the Virgin in response to the divine call. Overshadowed by the Spirit, the humble handmaid of the Lord so became the dwelling-place of divinity, the purist image of the holy Church.
It is a fitting feast to celebrate during Advent, as it is a time of the year that is intimately tied to the incarnation of Jesus Christ.
