“Every child is an arrow shot out of the bow of its mother, but its target is God. Children have come through mothers, but they do not belong to them. Mary acknowledges this claim of divinity on her Child by presenting Him back again to God, as she offers the temple of His Body in the temple made by hands.  Mary here anticipated the joy of every mother who brings her child to the baptismal font, where God may claim His own. But in the case of Mary the Child was claimed for sacrifice, as the aged Simeon said that He was a sign to be contradicted, and the cross is the contradiction. Mary was even told that a sword her own soul would pierce. That would happen when her Son on the cross would have His heart pierced with a lance. Through His Body and her soul would go that one stroke of the sword. She was the only mother who ever brought a life into the world to die. It is not so much our presents that God wants from us, as it is our presence, as we offer our life to Him.” Archbishop Fulton Sheen (The Fifteen Mysteries of the Rosary)