If we ever find ourselves stuck in prayer, one way to reorient our lives is to invoke the maternal aid of the Blessed Virgin Mary.
The Catechism of the Catholic Church explains that our Trinitarian prayers also unite us to the Mary:
In prayer the Holy Spirit unites us to the person of the only Son, in his glorified humanity, through which and in which our filial prayer unites us in the Church with the Mother of Jesus.
Mary is never the end of our prayers, but is a channel, a sign, who directs us to her Son, Jesus:
Mary gave her consent in faith at the Annunciation and maintained it without hesitation at the foot of the Cross. Ever since, her motherhood has extended to the brothers and sisters of her Son "who still journey on earth surrounded by dangers and difficulties." Jesus, the only mediator, is the way of our prayer; Mary, his mother and ours, is wholly transparent to him: she "shows the way" (hodigitria), and is herself "the Sign" of the way, according to the traditional iconography of East and West.
As many saints have remarked, the closer you get to Mary, the closer you get to Jesus.
She is able to envelop us with her maternal love, but does not keep us separated from God. Instead, she is constantly drawing us closer to him.
The next time you experience dryness in prayer, try turning to the Virgin Mary and let her point the way to Jesus.
