The Hail Mary
The Church's most loved prayer to Mary — Scripture's greetings followed by a request for her prayers.
Hail Mary, full of grace, the Lord is with thee. Blessed art thou among women, and blessed is the fruit of thy womb, Jesus. Holy Mary, Mother of God, pray for us sinners, now and at the hour of our death. Amen.
About this prayer
The first half joins the angel Gabriel's greeting (Luke 1:28) with Elizabeth's (Luke 1:42). The second half — a petition for Mary's intercession — took its current form in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries and was included in the Roman Breviary of 1568.