Mary, an obscure but feisty young woman from Nazareth, continues to have a powerful hold on the Catholic imagination. Rosemary Houghton writes.

Gerry Bourke SJ recalls his experience of devotion to Mary in Japan; he notes that it has been hugely important to Japanese Catholics going all the way back to the time of St Francis Xavier.

Declan Marmion SM reflects on Mary as the model of faithfulness and generosity in following Christ. He stresses the need to see Mary as a disciple and pilgrim of the early Church who was called to sanctity and to action.

Did Our Lady spend her last days in a small mountainside house overlooking Ephesus? Donald Carroll looks at the background to a great archaeological find near Kushadasi on the Aegean coast of Turkey.