I would like to speak to you this evening about some of the virtues of our Lady the Virgin as we consider her the mother of all the Saints.
As you all know the saints in our church have ranks and on top of all the saints is our Virgin St. Mary. She precedes all the heavenly multitude, the angels, the archangels, the cherubim and the seraphim and all the uncountable multitude of heaven. She precedes them because she is the Queen, the Mother of the King.
Therefore, in our Coptic Orthodox Church, we do not paint the icon of our Lady the Virgin alone but we paint her icon with her Son for her rank is derived from her being the Mother of the King.
