"Therefore a certain star has risen for us today: Our Lady Saint Mary means star of the sea; without doubt the star of this sea that is, the world. Accordingly, we ought to lift up our eyes to this star which has appeared on earth today so that she may lead us, so that she may enlighten us, so that she may show us these steps so we may recognise them, so that she may encourage us lest we fall back on the ascent, so that she may aid us in being capable of ascending. Therefore it is a beautiful thing that Mary is placed in this stairway of which we are speaking, there where we have to begin to climb. As the Evangelist says, Jacob begot Joseph, the husband of Mary, so immediately at our first conversion she appears to us and receives us into her care and enlightens us by her light and accompanies us along this laborious path."

(AELRED OF RIEVAUX, Comment on the Liturgical Sermons, Sermon 24 For The Nativity Of Holy Mary, edd. T. Berkeley and B. Pennington, Cistercians Publications, Inc Kalamazoo 2001, p. 333-334).