IS THERE A PLAN?

 

Every February 2 the Church celebrates the feast of the Presentation of the Lord, when Mary and  Joseph go to the temple in Jerusalem to offer the prescribed sacrifices required at the birth of a firstborn son. (Luke's account is the assigned gospel reading for the feast.) The incident is filled with symbolism and the fulfilment of prophecies. 

My meditation on the feast of the Presentation this year has been colored by recent tragic  events in the news in the U.S. and around the world. I invite you to reflect with me about whatver may e weighing you down today,

A central figure in the Presentation scene is an old man named Simeon who had been promised that he would live to see the Messiah. He took the infant in his arms and thanked God for fulfilling His promise. And he says to Mary,  

“Behold, this child is destined
for the fall and rise of many in Israel,
and to be a sign that will be contradicted
--and you yourself a sword will pierce--
so that the thoughts of many hearts may be revealed.”

This is a literary device that Luke is fond of, called a "programmatic prophecy," in which the speaker foretells how the story is going to unfold. I was thinking about the idea of "programmatic prophecy" this morning. It is based on a couple of fundamental assumptions: God has a plan for the world, this plan is ultimately about God's infinite love for the world, and thirdly, that loving plan is unfolding all the time, despite what it may look like to us humans.

The other central figure in the scene of the Presentation is Mary. She's really important to my reflections this year. Here's why: Two of our teachers dying within two weeks of one another doesn't sound like much of a plan to me. But sometimes we're faced, as Mary was, with deep, painful mysteries (--and you yourself a sword will pierce--) that are way beyond our intellect's ability to sort out logically. The gospel tells us that Mary kept pondering these things in her heart. Notice, not in her head, but her heart. We mustn't let the mystery of evil draw us up onto some high level of abstraction, because the Plan is invisible to the intellect, it won't yield to logical analysis. Mary humanizes the issue for us, and invites us to follow her lead by reflecting in our hearts with quiet confidence that the Lord is constantly loving and supporting us. There's an ancient litany of the Virgin Mary that includes the petition: "Mary, who kept the faith on Holy Saturday, Pray for us."

We all know people who have been so overwhelmed by the absurdity of some tragic event that they simply stop believing that there is a plan at all. For some mysterious reason,  they do not yet have the gift of Faith (or, more technically, the virtue of Hope, which allows us to hold on to our confidence in God despite the horrors and evils of this world).

This week I've been saying to the Lord, "I'm sorry, Lord, but this sure doesn't look like much of a plan to me. Or if it is a plan, it seems like a cruel one." And Jesus, who knows our human frailty firsthand, agrees: "Yes. I know just what you mean! I don't blame you for feeling that way. But I promise to help you to hang in there despite how terrible things seem. Try repeating the words I spoke to my Heavenly Father in the garden of Gethsemane, 'Not my plan but yours be done!'" 

I'm asking the Virgin to intercede for me and for my brothers and sisters around the world, that her son, our Lord, will indeed stand by each of us, young and old, as we work our way together through the mystery of the Hidden Plan.

(But, to be honest, I confess that it still doesn't look like much of a plan to me right now.)

A week ago I came across a passage in a book called "Come, Lord Jesus," by Mother Mary Francis, P. C. C. of the Poor Clares.

I keep reflecting on the three-page meditation on the Annunciation (p 201ff). The following is a mixture of my own thoughts and those of Mother Francis.

We are all familiar with the story of the Annunciation (Lk 1:26ff.), when the angel Gabriel appears to the young Virgin Mary and presents her with God’s plan. Her answer, which in Latin is only a single word, has become very well known. She says “Fiat,” meaning “Let it be done.“ This Response has become Christianity’s shorthand for submitting to God‘s will in one’s life.

But this Fiat,was only the first one of many that she uttered throughout her life. For her Fiat, is not something passive. Mary shows us not just how to say, Fiat, but how to live it, not only in the large, dramatic occasions of life, but in the little hidden ones. She had many a hidden Fiat to say in her life. 

Fiat is a very active word. Her “be it done” was said over and over and over. She was a very active doer in letting it be done. 

In the beginning, God said, “Fiat!” to light and it came into being. Through God‘s Fiat,, the world came into being. He spoke that word for each of us: “Fiat! Let him be.” And there I was. There you were.

In our own human fiats, we too have to be active doors in letting it be done. Fiat was not just a lovely word of God. It was a word that galvanized into action.

Fiat made the light to be, 

Fiat made the world to be, 

Fiat made the ocean to be, 

Fiat made Adam and Eve to be.

In the same way, our own Fiat must be the action of our whole life, expressed in our loving. 

Then Fiat really is done; it really is LIVED!

HEART HEALTH

 In 1944, Pope Pius XII instituted the universal feast of the Immaculate Heart of Mary to becelebrated annually on August 22.  In 1969, Pope Paul VI moved the celebration to the Saturday after the Solemnity of the Sacred Heart of Jesus. 

Today, June 28, as we celebrate the Feast of the Immaculate Heart of Mary, I’d like to reflect not on all those things that make us think of Mary as being so high above the rest of us mortals (conceived without original sin, a model of endless patience, constantly contemplating the Divine Presence, assumed bodily into heaven, etc.).

Rather, in reflecting on Mary’s Immaculate Heart, I would like to find a lesson or two that might be of help to you and me as we try to live the gospel each day. 

The Collect of the mass for the feast suggests an approach:

“O God, who prepared a fit dwelling place for the Holy Spirit

in the Heart of the Blessed Virgin Mary,

graciously grant that through her intercession

we may be a worthy temple of your glory.

Through our Lord Jesus Christ …"

This feast, then, celebrates the fact that Mary’s heart was a “fit dwelling place for the Holy Spirit.” Isn't this something we can aim at as we go through our everyday lives?

We can ask Mary’s help as we try to keep our hearts free from the clutter that often fills our hearts. When the Lord wants to come into our hearts will he find any room left there? Of will he find our hearts stuffed with worries and fears and preoccupations about our jobs, our children, our insurance coverage and car payments. 

Here's an exercise for the feast: Examine your own heart and look for the things that make it hard for the Lord to find there a “fit dwelling place.”

On this feast of the Heart of the Blessed Virgin Mary, let us pray in the words of the day’s Collect that “through her intercession we may be a worthy temple of your glory. Amen.”

IN A TIME OF VISITATION

 

Rosetti's Annunciation

The gospel reading for Friday, December 20 presented one of my favorite scenes from the Christmas narrative, the “Annunciation.” You remember it begins this way: In the sixth month the angel Gabriel was sent by God to a town in Galilee called Nazareth, to a virgin betrothed to a man named Joseph, of the house of David. The virgin's name was Mary. And he came to her and said, "Greetings, favored one! The Lord is with you!' But she was much perplexed by his words and pondered what sort of greeting this might be" (Lk 1:26-29). What follows is based on a post from several years ago.

Some Background

The Barren woman bears a child. The annunciation to Mary resembles certain other annunciation scenes from the Old Testaments. The most important of these is the announcement of the birth of Samson: 

Manoah and his wife

There was a certain man of Zorah, of the tribe of the Danites, whose name was Manoah. His wife was barren, having borne gel of the Lord appeared to the woman and said to her, ‘Although you are barren, having borne no children, you shall conceive and bear a son. Now be careful not to drink wine or strong drink, or to eat anything unclean, for you shall conceive and bear a son. No razor is to come on his head, for the boy shall be a nazirite to God from birth. It is he who shall begin to deliver Israel from the hand of the Philistines’ (Judges 13:2-5).

Luke’s choice of words points us to a messianic prophecy the Church uses on Palm Sunday: "Rejoice greatly, O daughter Zion! Shout aloud, daughter Jerusalem! Lo, your king comes to you; triumphant and victorious is he." (Zech. 9:9)

There is also a reflection of this shout of messianic joy in Zephaniah 3:14, "Sing aloud, O daughter Zion; shout, O Israel! Rejoice and exult with all your heart, O daughter Jerusalem!."

The image of a barren woman bearing a child and the messianic overtones in the passages that tell the “daughter” Jerusalem to “rejoice” at what is about to happen form just some of the background for Luke’s opening chapter. Let’s not forget the angel’s appearing to Zechariah to announce to him that his old, barren wife would bear a son, John the Baptist (Lk 1:7, etc.) 

"Hail, full of Grace." If you, like me, pray the “Hail Mary” constantly, you might be interested in a quick aside to look at what Luke’s original Greek text reveals about the angel’s greeting.

First, there’s the wonderful alliteration of the three “k” sounds in Gabriel’s “Chaire kecharitomene," (kyray kekahritoh meneh). Chaire is the normal word of greeting, “Hail.” I remember how we First Year Greek students used to exchange chaire with one another in the hallways just for fun. The second word is difficult to translate. It’s actually a verb (the perfect passive participle if you’re interested), charitoo, which means “to bestow favor upon, to favor highly, to bless.” The root of the word, char-, means “gift, grace.” The ending on the verb is feminine singular. So we can try translating the two words “Hail, O highly favored one” or “Hail, Gifted Lady.” 

St. Jerome translated it into Latin as “Ave, gratia plena,” “Hail, full of grace.” Although the word “grace” catches the Greek root of the verb, it seems to me to say both too much and too little. Gabriel is not telling Mary that she is filled with grace, but rather that she has been highly favored by God.

“The Lord is with you.” The strange greeting above is followed by “the Lord is with you.” To show just how odd and overwhelming this phrase was, Luke says that the young maiden (aged 12 or 13?) was “troubled” by the angel’s words. Let’s look at that word for a moment. In1:12 when Zechariah sees the angel that appears to him in the temple he is “troubled” (Greek terasso -- the RSV translates it a little strongly as “terrified”). So now when Luke describes this young teenage girl reacting to the appearance and the strange greeting of the angel, he uses not terasso but diaterasso, the dia- is an intensifier that adds the idea of “thoroughly.” The poor girl was “thoroughly terrified” by the angel! Or at least she was “utterly confused” by the words and “wondered what the greeting might mean” (v.29). Gabriel has to calm her down and tell her “Do not be afraid, Mary” (v.31).

John Collier, Annunciation 

We can only try to imagine Mary’s reaction to being told that she has been “highly favored” by God. Luke Timothy Johnson reminds us “She is among the most powerless people in her society: she is young in a world that values age; female in a world ruled by men; poor in a stratified economy. Furthermore she has neither husband nor child to validate her existence. That she should have “found favor with God” and be “highly gifted” shows Luke’s understanding of God’s activity as surprising and often paradoxical, almost always reversing human expectations. ("The Gospel of Luke," Liturgical Press, 1991, p. 39)”

SO WHAT?

Luke’s recounting of the annunciation offers us a couple of lessons that we can profit from. 

First, “God’s activity is often surprising and paradoxical,” as those barren women in the Old testament can testify and as young Mary found out that day as she was going about her daily work and suddenly and angel from heaven appeared to her. We must try to remember that God works the same way in our lives, that is, using mystery, paradox and surprises in working out the divine, loving plan. 

Second, Mary also experienced something that many of us have endured: “Sometimes God’s plan for us can be overwhelming or even terrifying.” Which is why we hear so often in the bible the words that Gabriel uses at the annunciation: "Do not be afraid!" Let us try to hear with the ears of faith those same words from heaven addressed to us:  "Do not be afraid!" If you haven't gotten that message yet, listen harder.

Third, I believe that many of the teenage girls and boys in our school would really be comforted to learn this lesson from the annunciation: God often uses the young, the powerless and the minority person to further the divine plan. If you find yourself in one or more of those categories, as Mary did, then you better stay on your toes: God probably has something special for you to do.

Finally, in reply to Mary's question about how all this was to take place since shoe had no relations with a man, Gabriel offers this reminder: “Nothing is impossible for God.” Let that belief be behind every prayer we utter.

May the Lord of the Impossible, the Lord of Surprises, bless all of us and keep us safe during this time of mysterious "visitation!"

.

Henry Owassa Tanner, Annunciation

MY PRIVATE PILGRIMAGE

Today, February 11, is the feast of Our Lady of Lourdes. So I just went back to my travel journal to refresh my memory of my visit to the sacred shrine in late January 1995. Here are just a couple of the things I wrote down:

I checked into my hotel room, a simple, clean one on the fourth floor and immediately headed for the

The Basilica at Lourdes

grotto and the Basilica. It was perhaps a 15 minute stroll. The town on this Friday night in January send sort of drowsy as I walked toward the center of things. Then as I turned up the Boulevard de la Grotte towards the shrine area the neighborhood became a ghost town. The street is lined with hotels, souvenir shops, and restaurants, but not one of them was open. Everything is closed for the winter. I walked in this solitude right onto the grounds of the Basilica from the time I walked through the gates, until I got almost to the grotto behind the Basilica more than five minutes, and all I saw not a soul. I was in a private pilgrimage! I got to the grotto, navigating by the glow of a great many candles that were flickering on the stand in front of it.

A cliff may be 40 feet high. And its bottom is an undercut in the shape of a rainbow that extends back into the stone phase for several yards with its front may be 20 feet high at the Apex and then getting progressively lower toward the back. As you face the grotto, you see about 15 or 20 feet up and to the right, just outside the shallow where undercut to park  a niche in the rock may be 5’ x 3’. It was in this niche that the Virgin Mary appeared to young Bernadette Subirous. today there is a statue there, illuminated at night.

There were four other people there with me. The only sound was the rush of water gushing from the famous spring end a stream of “Lourdes water.” it was as quiet as a church. No, better than that since the famous churches in Europe aren’t always quiet. It was as quiet as on the day when the lady in White first start a little Bernadette.

I prayed there in the cold a while. The churches were all locked up, so I strolled back to my hotel through to the deserted streets past roll down steel doors, and black, vacant windows of shops.

My journal entry for the following day contains a description of the basilica and its decorations, but my most lasting memory of Lourdes will always be of a wet Friday night, sitting on a wooden bench, and feeling privileged to be on a private pilgrimage to visit the shrine of Our Lady of Lourdes.

I wrote this little summary paragraph: 

I liked Lourdes. I was almost alone in that silent grotto, and walked the Basilica grounds in the dark silence. I was spared having to “look past” all the commercialism and crass hype, because in January, it’s not there. Just the grotto, the basilicas, and a few wet pilgrims like myself.

Our Lady of Lourdes, pray for us!

ASSUMPTION 2022 AND COVID

 This particular post is becoming an annual event during this time when we are all still suffering the effects of the COVID19 pandemic. I've left most of the text unrevised, but have added a couple of ideas.

Certainly we've discovered how many things can be accomplished virtually via various computer apps, and may even prefer that approach in certain circumstances. But now as restrictions have loosened,  many of us have had the pleasure of coming back into personal contact with people -- relatives, friends, colleagues, students -- and have come to truly appreciate the importance of physical presence and gestures like handshakes and hugs. 

As we come to experience the importance of physical presence to one another, we can profit from reflecting once again on the meaning of the feast of the Assumption, August 15..

QUID MIHI? 

The Latin question “Quid mihi?”, “What’s it to me?", was posed by certain non-Catholic theologians in protest when Pius XII declared in 1950 that the Assumption of Mary was a dogma of the Catholic Church: "Mary, having completed the course of her earthly life, was assumed body and soul into heavenly glory.”

When I do my daily lectio divina (reflective reading) with sacred scripture, I always ask myself "Quid mihi?": What does this reading mean for me? What is it saying to me? I think it’s a great question to ask as we celebrate the feast of Mary’s Assumption on August 15, not in protest but in an earnest effort to find some answers.

The following selection is from The Water and the Fire by Gerald Vann, O.P. The paragraph headings and any italics or emphases are mine. I hope you enjoy Father Vann’s answer to the question “What’s the Assumption to me?”

THE IMPORTANCE OF BODILINESS

The gulf between matter and spirit, between material things and the praise of God, is widening at a pace and to an extent hitherto unknown: it would be very easy to despair of this civilization of ours, very easy to despair of the future of our race, very easy to feel that, so far from marching triumphantly forward to a golden age, we are rushing headlong into an abyss; very easy to feel that our world is doomed because all the physical and material side of life must continue to drag man down and degrade him till the heavens are closed to him. But it is just at this moment that the voice of the Church comes to us like a challenge: we are on the contrary to shout aloud our belief in the dignity and holiness of material things; we are to affirm our faith and our hope in the future of man's flesh. The woman who stands in the heavens, the Mother of God, is also the mother of men, and her glory is the guarantee of theirs.
The doctrine of the Assumption is of supreme importance not only to Catholics but to all men and women because it means that there is still in the world, there will always be in the world, a voice to affirm and a power to defend the dignity and the ultimate glory of matter, of material things, of human flesh and blood, of the lovely mystery of human love, of the beauty which is the work of men's hands. There is a voice which affirms, there is a power which defends, all the material things which make life worth while; and they bid us be of good heart because we can hope in the end to achieve our own lives, full, rich, deep, unified, free, not by escaping from the flesh and material things, but by the healing and sanctifying of the flesh and material things.

In the greatest of the Church's definitions of doctrine concerning our Lady, the doctrine that she is the Mother of God, it was her Son that the Church was defending. But she is also the mother of all men; and here, in the doctrine of her Assumption, it is all her sons that the Church is defending. Just as the figure of motherhood is at the very center of the earthly history of every human soul, of the earthly history of the human race, so the figure of this Maiden-Mother is at the very center of the eternal history of individuals and of the race. If she is attacked, later on her Son will be attacked, and in the end her other children will be attacked. Men will begin by denying some part of the God-given greatness and glory; they will go on sooner or later to deny the divinity of her Son; and in the end there will be no defense for the greatness of humanity itself. The Church's voice is a challenge because, while it tells us to hope because in Mary the flesh is sanctified and glorified, material things are sanctified and glorified, it also tells us to beware because the dragon, defeated, went elsewhere to make war on the rest of her children. ...And he stood there waiting on the sea shore.

-- Gerald Vann, O.P. "The Water and the Fire" (New York, Sheed and Ward, 1961), pages 175-176. 

QUID MIHI?

Although we still live in a world of face masks and the avoidance of big crowds, we find ourselves able to "get back together" physically without barriers. May the feast of the Assumption help us to reflect on this experience and appreciate the gift of physical presence.

THE ASSUMPTION THIS YEAR

 

This year the feast of Mary's assumption into heaven, August 15, falls on a Sunday, giving more of the faithful a chance to reflect on this mystery. But it also comes at a time when everyone is suffering from the effects of the COVID19 pandemic. 

Certainly we've discovered how many things can be accomplished virtually via various computer apps, and may even prefer that approach in certain circumstances. But as restrictions have loosened a bit in certain places, many of us have had the pleasure of coming back into personal contact with people -- relatives, friends, colleagues, students -- and have come to truly appreciate the importance of physical presence and gestures like handshakes and hugs. 

As we come to experience the importance of physical presence to one another, we can profit from reflecting on the meaning of the feast of the Assumption.

QUID MIHI? 

The Latin question “Quid mihi?”, “What’s it to me?", was posed by certain non-Catholic theologians in protest when Pius XII declared in 1950 that the Assumption of Mary was a dogma of the Catholic Church: "Mary, having completed the course of her earthly life, was assumed body and soul into heavenly glory.”

When I do my daily lectio divina (reflective reading) with sacred scripture, I always ask myself "Quid mihi?": What does this reading mean for me? What is it saying to me? I think it’s a great question to ask as we celebrate the feast of Mary’s Assumption on August 15, not in protest but in an earnest effort to find some answers.

The following selection is from The Water and the Fire by Gerald Vann, O.P. The paragraph headings and any italics or emphases are mine. I hope you enjoy Father Vann’s answer to the question “What’s the Assumption to me?”

THE IMPORTANCE OF BODILINESS

The gulf between matter and spirit, between material things and the praise of God, is widening at a pace and to an extent hitherto unknown: it would be very easy to despair of this civilization of ours, very easy to despair of the future of our race, very easy to feel that, so far from marching triumphantly forward to a golden age, we are rushing headlong into an abyss; very easy to feel that our world is doomed because all the physical and material side of life must continue to drag man down and degrade him till the heavens are closed to him. But it is just at this moment that the voice of the Church comes to us like a challenge: we are on the contrary to shout aloud our belief in the dignity and holiness of material things; we are to affirm our faith and our hope in the future of man's flesh. The woman who stands in the heavens, the Mother of God, is also the mother of men, and her glory is the guarantee of theirs.
The doctrine of the Assumption is of supreme importance not only to Catholics but to all men and women because it means that there is still in the world, there will always be in the world, a voice to affirm and a power to defend the dignity and the ultimate glory of matter, of material things, of human flesh and blood, of the lovely mystery of human love, of the beauty which is the work of men's hands. There is a voice which affirms, there is a power which defends, all the material things which make life worth while; and they bid us be of good heart because we can hope in the end to achieve our own lives, full, rich, deep, unified, free, not by escaping from the flesh and material things, but by the healing and sanctifying of the flesh and material things.

In the greatest of the Church's definitions of doctrine concerning our Lady, the doctrine that she is the Mother of God, it was her Son that the Church was defending. But she is also the mother of all men; and here, in the doctrine of her Assumption, it is all her sons that the Church is defending. Just as the figure of motherhood is at the very center of the earthly history of every human soul, of the earthly history of the human race, so the figure of this Maiden-Mother is at the very center of the eternal history of individuals and of the race. If she is attacked, later on her Son will be attacked, and in the end her other children will be attacked. Men will begin by denying some part of the God-given greatness and glory; they will go on sooner or later to deny the divinity of her Son; and in the end there will be no defense for the greatness of humanity itself. The Church's voice is a challenge because, while it tells us to hope because in Mary the flesh is sanctified and glorified, material things are sanctified and glorified, it also tells us to beware because the dragon, defeated, went elsewhere to make war on the rest of her children. ...And he stood there waiting on the sea shore.

-- Gerald Vann, O.P. "The Water and the Fire" (New York, Sheed and Ward, 1961), pages 175-176. 

QUID MIHI?

In a world of social distancing and face masks and the avoidance of big crowds, as we find ourselves wishing we could just "get back together" physically without barriers, maybe the feast of the Assumption will have something relevant to say to us.

IN A TIME OF VISITATION

 

Rosetti's Annunciation

The gospel reading for the Fourth Sunday of Advent presents one of my favorite scenes from the Christmas narrative, the “Annunciation.” You remember it begins this way: In the sixth month the angel Gabriel was sent by God to a town in Galilee called Nazareth, to a virgin betrothed to a man named Joseph, of the house of David. The virgin's name was Mary. And he came to her and said, "Greetings, favored one! The Lord is with you!' But she was much perplexed by his words and pondered what sort of greeting this might be" (Lk 1:26-29). 

It seems to me that Luke’s recounting of the annunciation offers us a couple of lessons that might be helpful during these months of pandemic. What follows is based on a post from several years ago.

Some Background

The Barren woman bears a child. The annunciation to Mary resembles certain other annunciation scenes from the Old Testaments. The most important of these is the announcement of the birth of Samson: 

Manoah and his wife

There was a certain man of Zorah, of the tribe of the Danites, whose name was Manoah. His wife was barren, having borne gel of the Lord appeared to the woman and said to her, ‘Although you are barren, having borne no children, you shall conceive and bear a son. Now be careful not to drink wine or strong drink, or to eat anything unclean, for you shall conceive and bear a son. No razor is to come on his head, for the boy shall be a nazirite to God from birth. It is he who shall begin to deliver Israel from the hand of the Philistines’ (Judges 13:2-5).

Luke’s choice of words points us to a messianic prophecy the Church uses on Palm Sunday: "Rejoice greatly, O daughter Zion! Shout aloud, daughter Jerusalem! Lo, your king comes to you; triumphant and victorious is he." (Zech. 9:9)

There is also a reflection of this shout of messianic joy in Zephaniah 3:14, "Sing aloud, O daughter Zion; shout, O Israel! Rejoice and exult with all your heart, O daughter Jerusalem!."

The image of a barren woman bearing a child and the messianic overtones in the passages that tell the “daughter” Jerusalem to “rejoice” at what is about to happen form just some of the background for Luke’s opening chapter. Let’s not forget the angel’s appearing to Zechariah to announce to him that his old, barren wife would bear a son, John the Baptist (Lk 1:7, etc.) 

"Hail, full of Grace." If you, like me, pray the “Hail Mary” constantly, you might be interested in a quick aside to look at what Luke’s original Greek text reveals about the angel’s greeting.

First, there’s the wonderful alliteration of the three “k” sounds in Gabriel’s “Chaire kecharitomene," (kyray kekahritoh meneh). Chaire is the normal word of greeting, “Hail.” I remember how we First Year Greek students used to exchange chaire with one another in the hallways just for fun. The second word is difficult to translate. It’s actually a verb (the perfect passive participle if you’re interested), charitoo, which means “to bestow favor upon, to favor highly, to bless.” The root of the word, char- means “gift, grace.” The ending on the verb is feminine singular. So we can try translating the two words “Hail, O highly favored one” or “Hail, Gifted Lady.” 

St. Jerome translated it into Latin as “Ave, gratia plena,” “Hail, full of grace.” Although the word “grace” catches the Greek root of the verb, it seems to me to say both too much and too little. Gabriel is not telling Mary that she is filled with grace, but rather that she has been highly favored by God.

“The Lord is with you.” The strange greeting above is followed by “the Lord is with you.” To show just how odd and overwhelming this phrase was, Luke says that the young maiden (aged 12 or 13?) was “troubled” by the angel’s words. Let’s look at that word for a moment. In1:12 when Zechariah sees the angel that appears to him in the temple he is “troubled” (Greek terasso -- the RSV translates it a little strongly as “terrified”). So now when Luke describes this young teenage girl reacting to the appearance and the strange greeting of the angel, he uses not terasso but diaterasso, the dia- is an intensifier that adds the idea of “thoroughly.” The poor girl was “thoroughly terrified” by the angel! Or at least she was “utterly confused” by the words and “wondered what the greeting might mean” (v.29). Gabriel has to calm her down and tell her “Do not be afraid, Mary” (v.31).

John Collier, Annunciation 

We can only try to imagine Mary’s reaction to being told that she has been “highly favored” by God. Luke Timothy Johnson reminds us “She is among the most powerless people in her society: she is young in a world that values age; female in a world ruled by men; poor in a stratified economy. Furthermore she has neither husband nor child to validate her existence. That she should have “found favor with God” and be “highly gifted” shows Luke’s understanding of God’s activity as surprising and often paradoxical, almost always reversing human expectations. ("The Gospel of Luke," Liturgical Press, 1991, p. 39)”

SO WHAT?

As I wrote at the beginning of this post, Luke’s recounting of the annunciation offers us a couple of lessons that we can profit from during these months of pandemic. 

First, “God’s activity is often surprising and paradoxical,” as those barren women in the Old testament can testify and as young Mary found out that day as she was going about her daily work and suddenly and angel from heaven appeared to her. We must try to remember that God works the same way in our lives, that is, using mystery, paradox and surprises in working out the divine, loving plan. 

Second, Mary also experienced something that many of us have been experiencing during the ordeal of the last ten months as we watch the news of spiking death tolls and overwhelmed ICU's: “sometimes God’s plan for us can be overwhelming or even terrifying.” Which is why we hear so often in the bible the words that Gabriel uses at the annunciation: "Do not be afraid!" During this frightening time, we can hear with the ears of faith those same words from haven addressed to us:  "Do not be afraid!" If you haven't gotten that message yet, listen harder.

Third, although our Prep Division students haven't been on campus for months, I can think of a couple of them in particular who would really be comforted to learn this lesson from the annunciation: God often uses the young, the powerless and the minority person to further the divine plan. If you find yourself in one or more of those categories, as Mary did, then you better stay on your toes: God probably has something special for you to do.

Finally, in reply to Mary's question about how all this was to take place since shoe had no relations with a man, Gabriel offers this reminder: “Nothing is impossible for God.” Let that belief be behind every prayer we utter.

May the Lord of the Impossible, the Lord of Surprises, bless all of us and keep us safe during this time of mysterious "visitation!"

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Henry Owassa Tanner, Annunciation 

THE ASSUMPTION AND "DISTANCING"

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I don't know about you, but this business of physical distancing during the pandemic is making me realize how much I enjoy physical contact such as shaking hands or hugging. An angel would have no trouble with physical distancing, right? But not me! Among the dozens of lessons that covid-19 is teaching me, this appreciation of the importance of my "bodiedness" is up near the top. 

Today, August 15, the Church celebrates the Solemnity of the Assumption of Mary into heaven. This ancient non-scriptural tradition that holds that Mary, because she had given birth to the Messiah, was spared  from bodily corruption and instead was "assumed" directly into heaven. A little reflection on the meaning of this feast can perhaps shed a little light on our pandemic experience of physical distancing. 

The following selection is from The Water and the Fire by Gerald Vann, O.P. The paragraph headings and any italics or emphases are mine. Don't be distracted by Fr. Vann's 1961 approach to the use of masculine pronouns throughout. I hope you find his treatment timely and helpful:

THE IMPORTANCE OF BODILINESS

The gulf between matter and spirit, between material things and the praise of God, is widening at a pace and to an extent hitherto unknown: it would be very easy to despair of this civilization of ours, very easy to despair of the future of our race, very easy to feel that, so far from marching triumphantly forward to a golden age, we are rushing headlong into an abyss; very easy to feel that our world is doomed because all the physical and material side of life must continue to drag man down and degrade him till the heavens are closed to him. But it is just at this moment that the voice of the Church comes to us like a challenge: we are on the contrary to shout aloud our belief in the dignity and holiness of material things; we are to affirm our faith and our hope in the future of man's flesh. The woman who stands in the heavens, the Mother of God, is also the mother of men, and her glory is the guarantee of theirs.
The doctrine of the Assumption is of supreme importance not only to Catholics but to all men and women because it means that there is still in the world, there will always be in the world, a voice to affirm and a power to defend the dignity and the ultimate glory of matter, of material things, of human flesh and blood, of the lovely mystery of human love, of the beauty which is the work of men's hands. There is a voice which affirms, there is a power which defends, all the material things which make life worth while; and they bid us be of good heart because we can hope in the end to achieve our own lives, full, rich, deep, unified, free, not by escaping from the flesh and material things, but by the healing and sanctifying of the flesh and material things.

In the greatest of the Church's definitions of doctrine concerning our Lady, the doctrine that she is the Mother of God, it was her Son that the Church was defending. But she is also the mother of all men; and here, in the doctrine of her Assumption, it is all her sons that the Church is defending. Just as the figure of motherhood is at the very center of the earthly history of every human soul, of the earthly history of the human race, so the figure of this Maiden-Mother is at the very center of the eternal history of individuals and of the race. If she is attacked, later on her Son will be attacked, and in the end her other children will be attacked. Men will begin by denying some part of the God-given greatness and glory; they will go on sooner or later to deny the divinity of her Son; and in the end there will be no defense for the greatness of humanity itself. The Church's voice is a challenge because, while it tells us to hope because in Mary the flesh is sanctified and glorified, material things are sanctified and glorified, it also tells us to beware because the dragon, defeated, went elsewhere to make war on the rest of her children. ...And he stood there waiting on the sea shore.

-- Gerald Vann, O.P. "The Water and the Fire" (New York, Sheed and Ward, 1961), pages 175-176. 

As we each continue wrestling with the lack of physical contact, we can at least pray to our Blessed Mother that this period of enforced physical distancing can give us a renewed appreciation of and reverence for our bodies and our material world that God has given into our care.

On this feast of the Assumption let us ask the Blessed Virgin to help us to appreciate the holiness of our material selves.

P.S. Speaking of material selves, you might pray for me on August 18 when I'm having a total replacement of my left knee.

THE VISITATION

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As we get to the end of Advent, the lectionary invites us to reflect on the scene of the young virgin Mary visiting her older cousin Elizabeth. Elizabeth is six months pregnant with John the Baptist, while Mary has just been told that she herself is going to have a child. Luke, the great story-teller, narrates the meeting with wonderful emotion:

Mary set out
and traveled to the hill country in haste
to a town of Judah,
where she entered the house of Zechariah
and greeted Elizabeth.
When Elizabeth heard Mary's greeting,
the infant leaped in her womb,
and Elizabeth, filled with the Holy Spirit,
cried out in a loud voice and said,
"Blessed are you among women,
and blessed is the fruit of your womb.
And how does this happen to me,
that the mother of my Lord should come to me?
For at the moment the sound of your greeting reached my ears,
the infant in my womb leaped for joy.
Blessed are you who believed
that what was spoken to you by the Lord
would be fulfilled." (Lk 1:39-45)

The Visitation   - Raphael

In the Prado museum in Madrid there is this large painting of the Visitation. Elizabeth is clearly an older woman, holding the hand of the much younger Mary. Off in the background, to the left, you can see a future event: the tiny figure of John baptizing people in the Jordan River. 

The painting is hung well above eye level, inviting you to look upwards to contemplate the mystery of these two women who are depicted as monumental figures. I remember standing, staring in awe at this masterpiece and marveling at the way the artist has made both women seem larger than life, reflecting their central roles in the story of salvation.

What makes these women such towering figures? Neither of them seems rich, nor do they evoke military might or political power. How is it that these two women are so important in the unfolding story of salvation? The answer is in the masterpiece itself. Look at humility in Mary's expression, and her lowered eyes. Look at Elizabeth's body language, holding young Mary's hand and leaning forward affectionately as if about to embrace her. The scene is filled with things that our world does not seem to value: tenderness, humility, meekness, self-giving love. 

It seems to me that the artist has captured in these emotions the essence of "Emmanuel," "God-with-us:"  By bringing Christ to earth by giving him birth, the humble young virgin is inviting us to make him present every day ourselves. Not by power and might, not by wealth and domination, but by imitating her in her humility and meekness and in her trusting, as Elizabeth puts it, "that what had been promised her by the Lord would be accomplished".

This will be the lesson her divine son will teach as well. But it will turn out to be a hard sell indeed: He will die trying to show is that God is not about power and punishment, not about retribution and domination, but about self-giving love and redemptive suffering. Most religions seem to prefer a God that we can comprehend, that is, a God whose actions reflect our own tendencies toward vengeance, anger, strict unforgiving "justice" and the desire to dominate. But the little child soon to be born of Mary will challenge our presuppositions and preferences by revealing a God who washes our feet, who acts out of humble self-sacrificing, self-emptying love. Just like his mother.

MOTHERS AND ADVENT

Today, December 8, the Soleminty of the Immaculate Conception of Mary, our novice, Br. Mark Dilone, will profess his vows. Since it's going to be a busy day, I've decided to re-post something I wrote a couple of years ago that addresses the seeming self-centeredness that is so prominent in our lives as individuals and even as a nation. I hope you enjoy it. Please pray for Br. Mark and for our community -- and for more new members!

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Caryll Houselander 1901-1954 

My niece just gave birth to a baby boy, right in the middle of Advent. Pretty cool timing, right? It was certainly because of her that I was moved by a meditation read at vigils this morning. It was taken from the Christian spirituality classic written in Britain in 1944, The Reed of God, by Caryll Houselander, a British Catholic mystic, artist and writer. I enjoyed it so much that I’d like to share this excerpt with you. I found it online on the web site of Notre Dame University. I hope that my first publisher, Ave Maria Press, won’t mind a little free advertising as I borrow this excerpt from their edition of The Reed of God.

When a woman is carrying a child she develops a certain instinct of self-defense. It is not selfishness; it is not egoism. It is an absorption into the life within, a folding of self like a little tent around the child’s frailty, a God-like instinct to cherish, and some day to bring forth, the life. A closing upon it like the petals of a flower closing upon the dew that shines in its heart. 

This is precisely the attitude we must have to Christ, the life within us, in the Advent of our contemplation.

We could scrub the floor for a tired friend, or dress a wound for a patient in a hospital, or lay the table and wash up for the family; but we shall not do it in martyr spirit or with that worse spirit of self-congratulation, of feeling that we are making ourselves more perfect, more unselfish, more positively kind.

We shall do it just for one thing, that our hands make Christ’s hands in our life, that our service may let Christ serve through us, that our patience may bring Christ’s patience back to the world.

By his own will Christ was dependent on Mary during Advent: he was absolutely helpless; he could go nowhere but where she chose to take him; he could not speak; her breathing was his breath; his heart beat in the beating of her heart.

Today Christ is dependent upon us. In the host he is literally put into our hands. We must carry him to the dying, must take him into the prisons, workhouses, and hospitals…

The modern world’s feverish struggle for unbridled, often unlicensed, freedom is answered answered by the bound, enclosed helplessness and dependence of Christ – Christ in the womb, Christ in the host, Christ in the tomb.

This dependence of Christ lays a great trust upon us. During this tender time of Advent we must carry him in our hearts to wherever he wants to go, and there are many places to which he may never go unless we take him to them.

May you spend these days of Advent in calm, fruitful waiting for the coming of the Lord.

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