The one time I was ever at any Christmas Mass ever (very, very weird set of circumstances and only because I was singing in the choir), the music was poppy CCM stuff. So appreciate what you have! Merry Christmas

Christmas was beautiful, and my children got to attend their first Latin Mass-which was also their first Midnight Mass. Music stuff was great, no major issues. We are heading south to visit family now. :)

You misunderstand, Fr. Krisman.

"The father" doesn't have to mean the Son's Father. The Triune God is Mary's Father.

The whole Trinity creates in a unisubstantial act.

Thanks, Kathy and MJO, for your comments. However, I'm still not satisfied with St. Robert Southwell's formulation. We believe that the Blessed Virgin Mary is "the Mother of God" and not simply "the mother of Jesus of Nazareth," owing to the doctrines of the Trinity and of the hypostatic union. We can, and do, say that Mary is the Mother of the Incarnate Son of God, but we do not say that Mary is the Mother of God the Father or that she is the Mother of God the Holy Spirit. God the Father did not become the incarnate Son of God, born of the virgin Mary.

And I have no idea what Kathy means by "'The father' doesn't have to mean the Son's Father." How can Mary's Father not be the Son's Father?

I take Southwell to be using a metaphor, calling Christ "father" because he, the second Person of the Trinity, wills and therefore causes his own temporal Incarnation.

"To create is, properly speaking, to cause or produce the being of things. And as every agent produces its like, the principle of action can be considered from the effect of the action; for it must be fire that generates fire. And therefore to create belongs to God according to His being, that is, His essence, which is common to the three Persons. Hence to create is not proper to any one Person, but is common to the whole Trinity."

Summa Theologiae I.45.6.

I can't identify with Fr Krisman's reasoning. (Which is not to suggest that it isn't reasonable - only that I cannot identify with it.) He who creates (such as he who created the BVM) is, metaphorically, a 'father' to what he has created. I don't see the difficulty here. What if Southwell had said 'Behold, the creator has become his created's son'? Does this not make sense? The 'creator', of course, was he 'by whom all things were made' (Nicene creed).

As for being the Mother of God, I have encountered many, even in holy orders!, whose understanding of this was fuzzy if not outright heretical. Mary was the mother of God the Son's incarnation. She was not the mother of him who was 'begotten of the Father before all ages', she was not 'from of old', she was the mother only of the incarnation of the Son who was 'from of old', only of his incarnate manifestation. She was the mother of the God-Man, but not of his previous existence from eternity. She was not the mother of the Triune God, though I have met priests who thought that she was.

The doctrine surrounding this mystery can be very confusing and lead to much mistaken notions about the BVM. To hear some people talk, to observe much art and many Marian songs, and to read much Marian literature, one could easily get the idea that Mother Mary had her Baby all by herself, that he had no Father - which is brazen heresy - not to mention a blatant adventure in feminism - nor not to mention a negation of the necessary role of fatherhood.

And, if someone more competent than I would think to correct the way I have expressed these difficult things, I will gladly bow to him or her.

Many thanks for that nuance, Chonak!
You said beautifully what I was getting at but so clumsily botched.