For Mom

“If you went into someone’s house to visit a friend, wouldn’t you say ‘Hi’ to his Mom?”

With these words, a priest who has been a wonderful friend and guide in my Christian life, introduced the topic of the Blessed Virgin Mary to his RCIA class.

Divisive Topic
Probably no topic prompts more debate between Catholic Christians and those who left the Church in the 16th century than the Virgin Mary. Fr. Dwight Longenecker, an evangelical who is now a Catholic priest, even wrote a book on this topic based on a debate with a Christian friend.

My growth in faith and ability to honor our Lord’s mother has come through seven realizations.

1. Mary was the spouse of the Holy Spirit
   These words sound nonsensical, even sacreligious, until we realize that is exactly what the Bible declares in Luke 1:35. Trying to grasp this is difficult— especially if we have spent a lifetime thinking of Mary as simply a young Jewish girl given the honor of bearing the Savior. Choose, if you like, a different word than “spouse.” But look at the big picture. How else would you describe “being overshadowed,” leading to the birth of our Lord?
2. Mary robed our Savior with her flesh
   The Blessed Virgin Mary robed our Savior with her flesh. He was both God and man. His manhood, and the blood He shed on the cross for those who come to Him, was the result of His incarnation. His incarnation was made possible, in the will of God, through the flesh of the Virgin Mary.
3. Mary received God into herself
   Mary’s “yes” to God (Luke 1:31-38) is the precursor of the “yes” all of us must say, if we are to be reconciled to God through Jesus Christ. “Be it done to me according to your word.” Through baptism, we are overshadowed by the Holy Spirit and made children of God. But we must continually receive God into ourselves (Romans 10:9-11 and elsewhere) and daily recommit ourselves to living for Him. We must receive God into ourselves. Mary is the best example of an answer to the evangelical question, “Do you know when you invited Christ into your heart?”
4. Mary always pointed to her Son
   Most Christians know the biblical account of the wedding at Cana. When our Lord’s mother realized the newly-wed couple’s joyful occasion might be spoiled by the host having run out of wine, with faith she said to her Son, “They have no wine.” Then turning to the servants, “Do whatever He tells you.” If only each of us followed her admonition daily, how much better our Christian lives would be!
5. Mary suffered in a way few, if any, of us will suffer
   Surely anyone would shrink from the thought of seeing a beloved child tortured and executed. How much more difficult must it have been for the Blessed Virgin Mary? She saw her Son perform the miracle at Cana, heal the sick, and proclaim Himself “the way, the truth, and the life.” Yet Colossians 1:24 talks about “filling up what is lacking” in the afflictions of Christ. No believer would say Christ’s sacrifice was deficient. But apparently our sufferings matter. In that case, who, if any among us, has suffered like the Virgin Mary?
6. Mary is an example of purity
   In our sex-saturated 21st century, what could be more important than a shining example of purity? Pornography is instantly available 24/7. Women are viewed as sexual objects, not persons.¹ Human trafficking for sex is widespread. Hollywood makes increasingly sensual films and TV shows, while its executives and actors too often mimic the plots. Political figures have been humiliated, impeached, and even imprisoned, for sexual misconduct. Abortion has taken the lives of millions of unwanted, unborn children. Even the Church has endured the disgrace of its own sexual abuse scandal. Do we not need purity? Get close to Mom. Pray for purity. “Holy Mary, mother of God, pray for us sinners now and at the hour of our death.”
7. Mary is a picture of obedience
   Obedience is at the heart of the most pleasing offerings to God we can make. In Fr. Wilfrid Stinissen’s book, Into Your Hands, Father, he reminds us that our obedience—total abandonment to God—is to be patterned after Jesus, Mary, and Joseph.² God’s plan for our Savior’s birth begins with Mary’s obedience. He sends the angel Gabriel to the Virgin Mary with an astounding, incomprehensible message (Luke 1:26-34). “How can this be?” was her first reaction. But her obedience to God’s will follows immediately: “May it be done to me according to your word” (Luke 1:38). Describing Christ’s obedience, the New Testament book of Hebrews says, “Behold, I have come to do your will, O God” (Hebrews 10:7, Psalm 40:8). Joseph’s obedience, despite his initial concerns, was essential as Mary’s husband and the guardian of the infant Savior: “When Joseph woke from sleep, he did as the angel of the Lord commanded him” (Matthew 1:24).

We need pictures of obedience, Mary’s included, after which we can pattern our own lives. Fr. Jean C.J. d’Elbée writes of holiness, but it could as easily be said of obedience: “Holiness [obedience] is a disposition of the soul, of the heart, and, above all, of the will toward God.”³ May we seek, and nurture, that disposition of the will that leads to loving obedience to God.

As God prompts our Christian growth and compassion for the souls of others, each of us must be ready to tell his or her own spiritual story. We must wrestle with our own convictions about matters of faith.

What does your spiritual story say? What does it say about our Lord’s mother?

You’ve just read the chapter about Mom in my story. What’s yours?

 

¹ See Love and Responsibility by Bishop Karol Wojtyła (later Pope, and now Saint John Paul II). His subsequent teachings on human love were later compiled in Theology of the Body. As consequential as his papacy was in other ways, these two books may be his most important works for the 21st century. He points out that the opposite of love is not hate, but rather to treat a man or woman as an object, not a person. Similarly, his teaching suggests pornography’s worst evil is not that it shows too much, but that it shows too little—nothing of the interior person; simply an object being used for one’s pleasure.  For a shorter account of Saint John Paul II’s teachings on sexual intimacy, see Saint John Paul the Great, Chapter 8, titled “Human Love.”

² Fr. Wilfrid Stinissen, Into Your Hands, Father (San Francisco: Ignatius Press, 2001).

³ Fr. Jean C.J. d’Elbée, I Believe in Love: A Personal Retreat Based on the Teaching of St. Thérèse of Lisieux (Manchester, NH: Sophia Institute Press, 2001).