About AOS
Prayers to Our Lady
Hymn to Mary, Star of the Sea
Contemplating the sea
I glimpse your splendour…
Like the sea you are immense.
The distant horizon,
where our gaze is lost,
always escapes us
when we think we have reached it.
Like the sea…dazzling
as it sparkles in the sun.
My eyes then close,
fearing the burning light
that comes from its beauty.
Like the sea, you are profound.
Who can measure it
and sound its depths?
For fear that I might lose myself in it
it offers me its waves.
Like the sea, an ocean.
So wide and so mighty,
that the seafarer respects
and seeks at the same time.
He loves it, he needs it.
Like the sea, you are a mother.
Bearing the ships,
both great and small,
with their crews
from all nations.
Like the sea, you are a link.
Linking all peoples,
enfolding the earth
so that it may be one,
and live in solidarity.
On the sea coast,
somewhere in the world,
a seafarer’s child
remembers his father.
And down in his heart
he whispers an Ave Maria.
Seafarers' Prayer
O Mary, Star of the Sea, light of every ocean, guide
seafarers across all dark and stormy seas that they
may reach the haven of peace and light prepared in
Him who calmed the sea.
As we set forth upon the oceans of the world and
cross the deserts of our time, show us, O Mary, the
fruit of your womb, for without your Son we are lost.
Pray that we will never fail on life’s journey, that in
heart and mind, in word and deed, in days of turmoil
and in days of calm, we will always look to Christ and
say, “Who is this that even wind and sea obey him?”
Bright Star of the Sea, guide us!