ARK OF THE NEW COVENANT

Marian doctrines and titles such as Protectress of Christians, Queen Mother and Mediatrics with Christ find expression from the biblical basis in Mary as Ark of the New Covenant. Unanimous teachings of Apostolic Fathers plus evidence of early inscriptions and graffiti in Greek, Hebrew, Latin, Aramic, Syriac and Armenian in Catacombs excavations and Jewish- Christian cemeteries are incontrovertible witness of the ages.

We can comprehend this in the mindset of a first century Christian Jew, verify so for after all, Pope Leo XIII says we are all Semites in a sense. Christ did not abolish the Old Law, he fulfilled it in Christianity, where the fullness of Judaism shorn of pharisaic precepts resides. Early Christians recognized how types in the Old Testaments prefigured the realities in the New.

The Old Testament people venerated the Ark of the Covenant-- a box of acacia wood Yahweh instructed Moises to make,adorned with winged cherubim and fashioned with gold trimmings. Now why would Israelites pay homage to a fancy container crafted by human hands? Isn't that idolatry? What made it the holiest place on earth where it contains: God's Word inscribe in stone tablets, manna and stuff of the high priest. Aaron Scriptures says the Shekenah,God's presence,hovered over it like a cloud day and night (Exodus 40:31-34).

Mary, whom the Archangel Gabriel regarded as "full of grace" was overshadowed by the same Spirit of God at the Annunciation (Luke 1: 35). Elizabeth's greeting, "And why is this granted me that the mother of my Lord should come to me? For behold when the voice of your greeting came to my ears, the babe in my womb leapt for joy" (Luke 1:43-44), are foreshadowed in the Old Testament. David said, "How come the ark of the Lord come to me?" (2Samuel 6:8).His joyous dance and leaping before the Ark (2Samuel 6:16) replacated by John in his mother's womb(Luke 1:44)at the Visitation.

This biblical typology is proof that Mary is the Ark of the New Covenant, created and preserved to be a sinless vessel -- the holiest place on earth where Jesus, the Eternal Word, Eucharistic Manna and Everlasting High Priest took flesh. Preserved virginally pure and undefilled for nobody desecrated the dwelling place of the Lord. She bridges the Old and New Covenants. Her prototypes: Sarah, Rebecca,Rachel, Miriam,Deborah, Jael, Ruth,Hannah, Abigail, Esther, and Bethsheba. In her is the prophetic fulfilment of God's promise that the True Ark would be revealed in His New Temple.

John in exile at Patmos is given a vision of the heavenly temple liturgy where the Ark of the Covenant precedes the woman crowned with 12 stars (Revelation 11:19-12:1). The Fathers of the Church saw the woman to be the woman of Cana, at the foot of the Cross, and the same woman of the protoevangelium who would be at enmity with the serpent (Genesis 3:15).

Mary is a type of the Daughter of Zion and the Church. Her crown of 12 stars symbolizes both the Old Covenant and the New Covenant Apostles. She reigns with her Son as Queen Mother, prefigured in the kingdom of Judah by the giberah --- the queen mother, who reigned alongside the king and interceded for the people, a practice that started with Solomon ( 1 Kings 2:19-20).