Unit Overview

This unit explores the way in which Mary listened and responded to God in the events of her life. It highlights the importance and challenge in Christian life of listening, reflecting and trusting in the ways of God. It explores Marian prayers and feast days as ways in which the Church honours Mary, the Mother of God. The unit invites students to reflect on ways in which they can receive and respond to God’s call in their lives.

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Enduring Understanding

The Church honours Mary, Mother of God, as a woman who listened and responded to God’s call in the events of her life.

Objectives

A student will

value and appreciate and become aware of their religious identity and their spiritual heritage; appreciate the richness of the tradition and the need for community; be open to participation in the mission of the Church
develop an understanding of the nature and mission of the Church, both local and universal, and its history and teachings from its beginning to the present
analyse and communicate informed viewpoints on the nature and mission of the Church; review their experience in the light of its teachings; evaluate their participation in its undertakings

Outcomes

A student

appreciates how they can listen and respond to God in their lives. (RECVB4)
identifies how Mary, the Mother of God, listened and responded to God in her life. (RECKB4)
describes how the Church honours Mary, the Mother of God. (RECSB4)

Essential Questions

How can we use listening and reflecting to respond to God’s call in the events of our lives?
How did Mary, Mother of God, listen and respond to God’s call in the events of her life?
How does the Church honour Mary, Mother of God?

Learning Focus, Statements of Learning & Course Content

Students recognise that there are different types of listening, which require a response by

- engaging in a variety of reflective listening experiences.
- Define ‘listening’ and ‘reflecting’:
  ○ Explore the concept of listening and describe how we can use our senses to perceive and understand circumstances and events in our lives.
  ○ Explore how listening and reflecting brings us to a greater awareness of God’s presence in our lives through prayer.
- Engage in a variety of prayer experiences including Visio Divina, Lectio Divina and Christian Meditation.
- reflecting on God’s will for us through listening.
- Identify that through listening we learn about God’s call in our lives. It involves contemplating the events and experiences of one’s own life and discerning God in this.
- Explore Proverbs 3: 5-6 Trust in the Lord and recognise how we can grow in trust and understanding of God’s call in our lives through listening and reflecting.

Students deepen their understanding of how Mary, Mother of God, listened and responded to God’s call by

- exploring the Annunciation as Mary’s great ‘yes’.
- Explore Luke 1:26-38 The Annunciation (storytelling).
- Explain how Mary, Mother or God listened and responded to God.
- Examine The Angelus and make comparisons to The Annunciation (Luke 1:26-38) story.
- Discuss the implications of Mary saying ‘yes’ to God and explain how Mary’s ‘yes’ is a response to her living the call of God faithfully and fully.
- Identify times in our lives when we have had to trust in God, even when we may not have fully understood.
- exploring significant Scriptures passages involving Mary.
- Explore and interpret core Scripture passages that highlight events in Mary’s life. Include The Visitation (Luke 1: 39-45), The Finding of Jesus in the Temple (Luke 2:41-52), The Marriage Feast at Cana (John 2:1-12) and Mary at Calvary (John 19:25-27)
- Explore Scripture and prayer from the unit to reflect on Mary’s response to living the call of God faithfully and fully.

Students recognise how the Church honours Mary, Mother of God, by

- exploring Marian titles.
- Read and pray the Litany from KWL Book 4 Chapter 9 Our Prayer p70.
- Identify and describe the various titles used for Mary.
- exploring Marian Feast Days.
- Read and discuss KWL Book 4 Chapter 9 Did You Know p72.
- Identify and describe Marian feast days. Include:
  ○ Mary, the Holy Mother of God
  ○ The Annunciation of the Lord
  ○ Our Lady, Help of Christians
  ○ The Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary
  ○ Our Lady of the Rosary
  ○ The Immaculate Conception of the Blessed Virgin Mary
- Examine and pray the collect for the Solemnity of Mary, the Holy Mother of God.
- exploring the Rosary as a devotion to Mary.
- Read and discuss KWL Book 6 Chapter 14 Our Heritage p137 and explore the origin of the Rosary and why we pray it.
- Read and discuss the images presented in KWL Book 4 Chapter 9 p66-67 and investigate the mysteries of the Rosary using Scripture.
- Identify how the Rosary is prayed, using Rosary beads.
- Pray the Rosary, meditating on the significant events in the lives of Mary and Jesus.

Compulsory Scripture

Unit Content 1
Proverbs 3: 5-6 Trust in the Lord

Unit Content 2
Luke 1:26-38 The Annunciation
Luke 1:39-45 The Visitation
Luke 2:41-52 The Finding of Jesus in the Temple
John 2:1-12 The Marriage Feast at Cana
John 19:25-27 Mary at Calvary

Unit Content 3
Scripture references for the mysteries of the Rosary

Storytelling

Unit Content 2:
Luke 1:26-38 The Annunciation

Church Documents

Catechism of the Catholic Church

273 – Only faith can embrace the mysterious ways of God’s almighty power. This faith glories in its weaknesses in order to draw to itself Christ’s power (2 Cor 12:9, Phil 4:13). The Virgin Mary is the supreme model of this faith, for she believed that “nothing will be impossible with God,” and was able to magnify the Lord: “for he who is mighty has done great things for me and holy is his name” (Luke 1:37,49).

967 – By her complete adherence to the Father’s will, to his Son’s redemptive work, and to every prompting of the Holy Spirit, the Virgin Mary is the Church’s model of faith and charity. Thus she is a “preeminent and … wholly unique member of the Church”; indeed, she is the “exemplary realization” (typus) of the Church.

491 – Through the centuries the Church has become ever more aware that Mary, “full of grace” through God, was redeemed from the moment of her conception. That is what the dogma of the Immaculate Conception confesses, as Pope Pius IX proclaimed in 1854.

1854 – The most Blessed Virgin Mary was, from the first moment of her conception, by a singular grace and privilege of almighty God and by virtue of the merits of Jesus Christ, Saviour of the human race, preserved immune from all stain of original sin.

974 – The Most Blessed Virgin Mary, when the course of her earthly life was completed, was taken up body and soul into the glory of heaven, where she already shares in the glory of her Son’s Resurrection, anticipating the resurrection of all members of his Body.

828 – By canonising some of the faithful, i.e. by solemnly proclaiming that they practised heroic virtue and lived in fidelity to God’s grace, the Church recognises the power of the Spirit of holiness within her and sustains the hope of believers by proposing the saints to them as models and intercessors. “The saints have always been the source and origin of renewal in the most difficult moments in the Church’s history.” Indeed “holiness is the hidden source and infallible measure of her apostolic activity and missionary zeal.”

KWL

Unit Content 3

KWL Book 4 Chapter 9 Our Prayer p70
KWL Book 4 Chapter 9 Did You Know p72
KWL Book 6 Chapter 14 Our Heritage p137
KWL Book 4 Chapter 9 p66-67

Prayer

Prayers of Tradition
The Rosary
The Angelus

Eucharist and Liturgical Rites
Collect for the Solemnity of Mass of Mary, the Holy Mother of God

Praying with Scripture
Visio Divina
Lectio Divina
Guided Meditation

Eucharist/Eucharistic Living

Apostolic Constitution

Through Mary’s example, we are called to listen and respond to God.

As a Church, and individually, we honour Mary through prayer and feast days.

Marian Perspectives

This unit is dedicated to Mary, Mother of God – as a woman who listened and responded to and trusted in God.

General Capabilities

Australian Curriculum
Cross Curriculum Priorities		The General Capabilities
	Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander histories and cultures		Critical and creative thinking
	Asia and Australia’s engagement with Asia		Ethical understanding
	Sustainability		Information and communication technology capability
Other important learning identified by the NSW Educational Standards Authority (NESA):			Intercultural understanding
	Civics and citizenship		Literacy
	Difference and diversity		Numeracy
	Work and enterprise		Personal and social capability

B4 – Mary, Mother of God