No longer I who live

Feast of the Presentation of the Lord

Today is the Feast of the Presentation of the Lord but it also happens to be the anniversary of my sacerdotal ordination. Now, the anniversary of our ordination is usually a pretty big thing for us priests, even bigger than our birthdays. For this reason, the Missal allows us to celebrate a special liturgy for the occasion. But given that this feast is a big thing for the Church, I’ve always had to swallow my pride and take a back seat. It’s the festival of lights and the spotlight should be on Christ, the Light of the World.

But this year, I’ve decided to speak about the priestly and religious life. It would be absolutely self-serving if I chose this theme purely on the basis that it has to do with me. Since 1997, this feast has also been celebrated as the World Day for Consecrated Life, as Saint John Paul II explained when he instituted it: "The Virgin Mother who carries Jesus to the temple so that he can be offered to the Father expresses very well the figure of the Church who continues to offer her sons and daughters to the heavenly Father, associating them with the one oblation of Christ, cause and model of all consecration in the Church.”

During a brain-storming session last year with some of the leaders of this parish, one of the items we wished to highlight for this year, being a special Jubilee year for our parish, is the promotion of vocations to the priesthood and the religious life. In our centennial long existence, we have only produced one priest! If that is not a travesty, it should be a tragedy. Perhaps, the lack of vocations to the priesthood and religious life in this parish may have to do with the ability to sacrifice, or the lack of it, to consecrate to God what belongs to Him.

The link between family life and consecrated life is essential. For it is in the family that young people have their first experience of Gospel values and of the love which gives itself to God and to others, which is at the heart of the act of consecration. It is the family, that children should learn the value of service, of sacrifice, of giving our best to God instead of just keeping the best for ourselves and leaving the scraps for God.

The spirit of sacrifice, of giving, of rendering to God our best and our most treasured possession is what we witness in the gospel. St Joseph and the Blessed Virgin Mary undertook their sacred duty to present their child Jesus to God in an act of consecration. But here is the paradox of this scene. Our Lord has no need of consecration, because He is the Divine Word in the flesh, and yet allows His earthly parents to make this act of consecration to His Heavenly Father. They perform in external ritual what Jesus already is in reality, the Only Begotten Son of God. And our Lord Jesus then consecrates His earthly parents and the whole world to His Heavenly Father by mystically uniting them with His life, death and resurrection. They are saints because of Him.

The heart of the scene is certainly the Lord Himself. All attention, affection, expectation, and wonder are focused on the Light of the World. But the ones who surround Him all have in common a total gift of self. They have given everything to be there, both their past and future. St Joseph gave up his expectations for a normal married life. Mary gave up her autonomy to assume the great responsibility of bearing the Saviour of the World. Both Simeon and Anna gave up their youth in long years of waiting for the Messiah. Our Lady and St Joseph, Simeon and Anna, show us that Jesus is the One worth living for, the One worth all of our love, the only One whose claim on our hearts can bring to fulfillment the Love that has been promised us when He first invited us to “Follow Him”.

In each of these figures, we see a call to imitate Jesus, the Light of the World, who gave Himself wholly to do the Father’s will and in accordance to the Father’s will, gave up His life in atonement for our sins and to reconcile the world to the Father. In each of them, we come face-to-face with a vocation that demands all the human heart can give. Not only are we called to give each passing moment to God, but also to accept in advance whatever His will might bring in the future, whether it be a great blessing or sword.

Twenty two years ago, I was presented to the Church for ordination as a priest. In the theological language of the Church, I was configured to Christ. Something changed, a profound and radical change which is invisible to the eye. Sure, my quirks are still there. Sure, I get occasionally testy and snappy and impatient with those around me. Sure, I get tired and frustrated. But something objectively changed. It was more than a change of title or job, or a costume change, with me exchanging my lay civilian clothes for a religious uniform, but this fundamental change which I underwent is what we call an ontological change, a change of my entire being. As St Paul beautifully explains the experience of such change in Gal 2:20, “It is no longer I who live but Christ lives in me.”

As we priests experience an ontological change at our ordination, baptism also brings about an ontological change in each of the faithful. In baptism, we are made children of God, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people set apart for the worship of God. In baptism, we become a new creation. The old has been put to death on the cross. In Holy Orders, the priest is configured to Christ at his ordination, in a way calling for a permanent and lasting commitment, through a share in Christ’s eternal priesthood. The priest does not just emulate Christ. He is not just a substitute or a stand-in for Christ. Through ordination, the priest becomes Christ. That is the audacity of God. He takes an ordinary man with all his limitations and even sinfulness, and changes him into something else, not just a mere representative or ambassador, but to stand in the person of Christ Himself - in persona Christi.

Yes, the holy priesthood is a grace to the Church and to the world, but it is also a work of grace. What a priest is and what he accomplishes come from divine grace. In an era of personality cults, this is a humbling realisation for any priest, a realisation that leads to St Paul’s conclusion: “I can do all things in Him who strengthens me” (Phil 4:13). The efficacy of our priesthood is derived from its true source, Christ. In order that a priest remains faithful to his priestly ministry, it is so essential that he remains in the Perfect High Priest Himself. Now, does this mean that you would see a “Fr Michael” incapable of making mistakes? Ordination isn’t Canonisation! Priests like everyone else remain sinners. But just like everyone else, he is called to holiness and through the sacrament of holy orders, he is called to configure himself to Christ. The weakness and sinfulness of a priest does not take away the efficacy of God’s grace but rather accentuates the truth that all is graced and that nothing can be accomplished without the grace and power of God.

So, my dear friends, on this great Festival of Light, even as the spotlight is centered on Christ, who as Simeon prophecies is “a light to enlighten the pagans and the glory of your people Israel,” spare a prayer for me, His humble servant. The Light of Christ illuminates those around Him, even if sometimes we choose to remain in semi-darkness. Pray for me … not for good health, or good wealth, not for greater wisdom or more pizzaz in my delivery. Pray only that I remain faithful to Christ whom I have been consecrated to. Pray as St Paul did, that “It is no longer I who live but Christ lives in me.” And that is the only thing which matters!

Treasure and Ponder

Solemnity of Mary Mother of God

In this short passage, we can glean four themes or names (both current and former) of today’s feast. There is an element of thanksgiving as we reminisce. The passage also points to two earlier names given to today’s feast, the Feast of the Circumcision of the Lord and the Feast of the Holy Name of Jesus, in Jewish custom, both these titles commemorate the same event. And of course, we are reminded once again that Mary is the mother of Jesus and that Jesus is no ordinary child. He is the Son of God which makes our Lady the Mother of the Son of God, or in short, the Mother of God.

But today I would like to focus on what Mary did when she heard the report of the heavenly host of angels and their message intended for this child from the lips of humble shepherds. Instead of a petulant, sulking and exhausted young mother adversely reacting to all the mishaps on that first Christmas night, a nightmarish disaster, we see the exact opposite - a woman who was composed, meditative and grateful. This is how St Luke describes Mary’s composure and demeanour: “she treasured all these things and pondered them in her heart.”

The Greek word for “treasured”, syneterei, means “kept save” or “protected.” It is used twice to speak of Mary’s reaction to the events of the infancy of her child, Jesus. The first instance is here in today’s gospel passage after she had given birth, and the shepherds had left. Then later at the end of Chapter 2, we see Mary reacting to another incident in the life of her child, now a young adolescent. Those of you with children transitioning into teenage years will know how this story resonates with you. She and Joseph had just lost their 12-year-old in the Temple, and upon finding Him, they must have been shocked by His nonchalance attitude. Yet, St Luke again tells us ‘His mother treasured all these things in her heart’.

The word ‘treasure’ has to do with what has most value to us. And sometimes we do not really appreciate the value of something until we’ve lost it. When something is common-place and readily available, we often treat it with contempt because we know that if we were to lose it, it would be so convenient to buy a replacement off the shelf. But when something is rare, we will appreciate its true value when we no longer have it. The months of lockdown during the pandemic has been a painful experience for many, especially Catholics deprived of the Eucharist due to the shuttering of churches. So many Catholics later shared with me how the absence of the Eucharist in their lives had led to an insatiable and painful hunger. Online Masses can only provide so much band-aid to a Catholic deprived of the sacraments, but it cannot fill the gaping hole in his starving soul. But those months of social distancing had also helped them cultivate a deep longing for what they had often taken for granted and have little thought of, once received.

To treasure is not just at the heart of gratitude but the way of prayer. Christian prayer begins in treasuring and pondering these things. And through prayer, every experience, whether painful or sweet, can be transformed into gratitude. That’s where Mary shows us the way, with regard to our own life and experience. Now most people will tell you that it is easy to ‘treasure these things’ when the events and words are all positive. We treasure sweet memories, the highlights of successes and achievements, we immortalise what is favourable to us by filling our display cabinets, walls and photo albums with trophies, memorabilia, and photographs, reminders of the most positive and memorable experiences in our lives.

But Mary shows us that we can’t be selective when we wish to “treasure” things. The befuddlement she must have experienced upon hearing the angel’s announcement, the prospect of being rejected and stoned to death if it was known that she was with child without being married, the arduous journey to Bethlehem while she was heavily pregnant, the inhospitable and unsanitary conditions in which she had to deliver her child and the visit of a rag-tag group of undesirables in the form of shepherds, the inability to fully comprehend the nature and mission of her child and finally, the horror of having to witness her own Son’s execution, would have been some of the things which she had to endure, treasure and ponder upon.

The painful as much as the pleasant, what breaks the heart as much as what fills it with joy is to be contemplated, prayed and be grateful for. This is what we do when we look back at the events of last year. This is what Mary teaches us. That’s the example she shows. Prayer in this contemplative sense is for all of us, because all our lives are a mixture of what pleases and what pains, and all the grey areas in between. All our experiences, be they welcomed or unwelcomed, are to be the subject matter of our prayer. Our Blessed Mother was able to hold the terrible tension and pain of these long moments without wilting or breaking down or sinking into despair. To ponder in this sense is no joke; prayer in this sense is no joy, to be grateful in this sense requires more than human effort. It is all endurance and grace.

Mary’s experiencing of treasuring and pondering helps us to see that God didn’t abandon us even when all is dark and uncertain. If suffering provides us opportunities to love others, trials will give us opportunities to grow in faith and the uncertainties of the future will give us more opportunities to place our hope in the Lord. So, on this day as we celebrate a new calendar year, as we celebrate Mary’s Divine motherhood, as we thank God for the gift of Mary as our mother too, we look ahead into the unknown future, knowing that our God will never desert us no matter what circumstances we find ourselves in. It is also a day to be thankful, to be grateful, for all the opportunities we have been given this past year. Mary teaches us that with Jesus by our side, that’s a blessing we should never ever take for granted.

This is the day the Lord has made. Let us rejoice and be glad in it.

Proclaiming the Glory of God

Solemnity of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary

Today’s feast does not sit well with Protestants. It will be no surprise that those for whom the bible is paramount, for whom nothing can be said without clear biblical justification, the doctrine of the Assumption is not something they are easy with. We use the gospel reading on the Visitation, because there is nothing in the gospels that describes the Assumption in the way that the Visitation is described. Elsewhere, Psalm 132, where the Blessed Virgin is interpreted as the “Ark of God” that is taken into heaven, is cited. Along with similar interpretations of Genesis 3:15, 1 Corinthians 15:54, and Revelation 12:1-2, this hardly amounts to an explicit expression of the dogma of the Assumption; on their own, they are not a ringing endorsement. So, why is this gospel passage selected for today? How do we draw a trajectory from the Visitation to that of the Assumption?

We know so little of Mary even from the few scriptural references to her. How could the Church, therefore, make this leaping conjecture to speak of her as the most honoured and glorified creature of God, exalted above all creation, and uniquely sharing the privilege of incorruptibility of her Son at the end of her earthly sojourn? I would like to propose that the answer to all these questions is found in the great hymn of Mary, the Magnificat, described by Pope Benedict XVI as a “marvelous canticle (that) mirrors the entire soul, the entire personality of Mary. We can say that this hymn of hers is a portrait of Mary, a true icon in which we can see her exactly as she is.”

The Blessed Virgin Mary confesses in the inspired hymn, guided by the Holy Spirit, that the source of her “greatness” and “blessedness” is not found in any personal merit but in God. She does not exalt herself as others are prone of doing but immediately the greatness of God when she hears of Elizabeth’s praise of her and the child within her womb. Just as the Magnificat is a song that glorifies and exalts God, today’s feast of the Assumption is an Opus Magnum to God who raises her up to share in His heavenly glory. 

The erudite Pope Benedict continues to explain: “Mary wanted God to be great in the world, great in her life and present among us all. She was not afraid that God might be a “rival” in our life, that with his greatness he might encroach on our freedom, our vital space. She knew that if God is great, we too are great. Our life is not oppressed but raised and expanded: it is precisely then that it becomes great in the splendour of God. The fact that our first parents thought the contrary was the core of original sin. They feared that if God were too great, he would take something away from their life. They thought that they could set God aside to make room for themselves.”

But this is not the case of Mary. She understood that her lowliness and littleness was the perfect occasion for God to exhibit His power and greatness. This was no virtue-signaling stemming from a misguided sense of false humility. Although what God had done and was doing in her life was radically new, because nothing like the Incarnation had ever happened or could ever be conceived, it was not a radical departure from what God had done in history and will continue to do until the end of time. The Assumption is precisely the best testimony and proof of what the Lord has promised to do in scripture and what Mary had sung in this song of praise. 

The difficulty of Protestants and other detractors in accepting the dogma of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary is that they often confuse this event with the Ascension of our Lord Jesus Christ. At a superficial level, one could say that the Ascension is recorded in the gospels while Mary’s Assumption isn’t. If the Bible was the only record of revelation, this would be irrefutable proof that the belief in the Assumption is untenable. Case closed. Full stop. But for us Catholics, the deposit of faith is not only found in written Sacred Scripture but also in oral Sacred Tradition, the former affirming the validity of the latter. Although there is no record of the life and death of Mary after the death, resurrection and Ascension of her Son, Sacred Tradition provides us with the source material to fill in the blanks. While the relics and tombs of the apostles were venerated from the earlier centuries, Mary left no first relic  of her physical body. But we honour the place where she was buried and just like her Son, our Lord Jesus Christ, the tomb is empty. There is no body because as the Catechism of the Catholic Church teaches: "Finally the Immaculate Virgin, preserved free from all stain of original sin, when the course of her earthly life was finished, was taken up body and soul into heavenly glory, and exalted by the Lord as Queen over all things, so that she might be the more fully conformed to her Son, the Lord of lords and conqueror of sin and death."The Assumption of the Blessed Virgin is a singular participation in her Son's Resurrection and an anticipation of the resurrection of other Christians.”"

So, the real fundamental difference between the Ascension of our Lord and the Assumption of our Lady would be their respective causes. The Ascension of Christ was by His own power. Only Christ has ascended to Heaven. In the Gospel of St. John, Jesus told Nicodemus, ”No one has ascended into Heaven but he who descended from Heaven, the Son of man” (John 3:13). But the Glorification of Mary’s body and her Assumption was not by her own power, however. It was by the decision and act of God. So, to deny that it is impossible for Mary to be assumed into heaven both body and soul, is a direct affront to the sovereignty and power of God - to assert that God is powerless to do so.

Although the Assumption of Mary and the Ascension of the Lord are two different events, both of them indicate a way of elevation for us, human and spiritual, to which we are all called. The beauty of these callings is that they invite interior growth, renovation and transformation in our lives. Furthermore, these celebrations of our Church remind us that “death” is not the end of our human story. Death is just a transition to the true life with God, life eternal in the fullness of God’s love.

 

At the end of Mary’s life on earth, Mary is taken up to heaven in body and soul. She, who never knew sin, was assumed into heaven and never experienced corruption. Mary, as the new Eve, fulfilled God’s plan from the beginning of creation. Mary always lived perfectly in the will of God. The handmaid of the Lord has laid down for us the perfect model of discipleship that we may follow. We are called to live in the will of God and we don’t have to do this alone. She is there to help us.

A Betrothal and a Wedding

Solemnity of the Annunciation

A long forgotten Catholic tradition is the rite of betrothal, a mutual promise, vocally expressed between a man and woman, pledging future marriage to one another in the Church. In a certain way, this seems to have been supplanted by modern engagement ceremonies. And yet, parties often wish to dispense with all these formalities as quickly as possible. Couples find it unbearable to undergo what they consider as lengthy marriage preparation courses or even practice sexual continence during courtship. In fact, parties can’t wait to share a bed and start living together before they have tied the knot, what more announce their plans to be married.

The event of the Annunciation speaks of both a betrothal and a wedding. It is certainly not referring to the betrothal of St Joseph to the Blessed Virgin Mary, though we are told in scriptures that they were betrothed before the Annunciation. The Hebrew concept of erusin (“betrothal”) is the first of two stages of an ancient Jewish marriage rite. Joseph and Mary are not engaged at the time of the Annunciation; they are, in fact, legally married. Although the espoused couple could not yet live together, the Mosaic Law safeguarded the marital goods of fidelity and permanence during this twelve months period: adultery was punishable by death (cf. Deut 22:23-27), and separation was possible only by means of a legal divorce. Moreover, erusin is akin to the canonical principle of a ratified marriage without consummation. Marital relations (and, hence, the good of children) were proscribed until nissuin, the second stage of the marriage, when the couple finally came to live together.

But the gospel and feast today does not focus on the betrothal of St Joseph and the Blessed Virgin Mary, but rather the betrothal and the wedding between the Holy Spirit and Mary. This may seem shocking to many of us, including Catholics, as we are conditioned to believe and even revere Mary as a perpetual virgin, and that her relationship with St Joseph was a uniquely chaste one. The pious custom of referring to the Holy Spirit as the spouse of Mary is a symbolic expression of Mary’s perpetual virginity (rather than a rejection of it) and affirms the virgin birth of Jesus. It is not meant in a literal manner but rather in terms of Mary’s singular devotion to God and unique relationship to the Trinity. It is similar to how religious sisters sometimes refer to Jesus as their spouse.

In the case of the Annunciation, the angel Gabriel acts as an intermediary, a divine matchmaker who offers God’s proposal to Mary. Just like a scene in a romantic movie, the audience waits with anticipation. Will the girl accept the offer and invitation? Will she say “Yes”? It would have turned out differently if the answer was a “No”. But thank God, this young girl did say “Yes,” and the whole story of salvation reached its climax here.

What was contained in that single “yes”? By saying "Yes", the Holy Spirit “came upon” or overshadowed Mary, reminiscent of how the glory of God came upon the portable tabernacle and later the Temple in Jerusalem. With Mary’s “Yes,” the bond between man and God was sealed as the nuptial bond of husband and wife are sealed at the moment they freely exchanged their consent with each other in marriage. God could become man, the Word became flesh and offered His life on the Cross. Because of the Incarnation, His death would be real and because His death was real, so was His resurrection. In other words, if Mary had said No, we would not have Christmas, and without Christmas, there would have been no Good Friday and without Good Friday, Easter would not have existed. One can say that our whole Christian calendar depended on what happened on this Feast.

The whole plan of salvation depended on this single moment. Mary’s “Yes” may seem insignificant but it is the most incredible and most important answer and decision ever made by a creature of God. At that very moment, heaven was wedded to earth and the rest is history. Through the fiat of the Virgin Mary, all of creation participates in this mystery and begins to be transformed.

You see Mary is not only the first Christian and most preeminent member of the Church, she is also a model of the Church, a paradigm for what God wills to accomplish, in and through the Church. Mary is the epitome of the Church, “not having spot or wrinkle or any such thing … holy and without blemish” (Eph. 5:27). As type and foremost member of the Church, Mary stands as the pledge of what Christians shall become in the next life. What Mary is, so we shall be. Because of what Mary did and what God did for Mary, the future is now open to every human: to enter into the glory of heaven.

The Best Wine for the last

Second Sunday in Ordinary Time Year C

Every drinker would appreciate the wisdom found in this Bible verse taken from the Book of Ecclesiastes (9:7), “Go, eat your food with gladness, and drink your wine with a joyful heart, for it is now that God favours what you do.” Wine or alcohol can be a bringer of joy, albeit temporary. But when the initial momentary elation wears off, the mood can descend into tears, anger, and even violence... and don’t forget the massive hangover that is certain to follow. After the string of drinking parties stretching from Christmas to the New Year, it’s time to sober up. The celebration is literally over when “we have run out of wine”, money and leave!

The Bible treats intoxicating drinks ambivalently, considering them both a blessing from God that brings joy and merriment, and potentially dangerous beverages that can be sinfully abused. The wine in today’s gospel story bears the first sense. Thank God for that! The symbol of wine used with the theme of the wedding feast expresses the exhilarating joy of ‘the Hour,’ not just the hour of nuptial bliss for the couple, but the ‘Hour’ marking the decisive intervention of God and manifestation of His glory in Christ. This is the hour of Israel’s liberation. Her Saviour has come! But just when the celebrations were gaining momentum, it risked being turned into a disaster. The festivities encountered an untimely snag: “they ran out of wine.” The mother of Jesus announces the sobering news, “They have no wine.” For all those present, this would have sounded like a death sentence.

This incident is a very fitting illustration of the failure of all this world’s joys. As much as we hope for an inexhaustible supply of resources, as much as we pray that the party and the honeymoon will never end, we always end up with an empty casket after everything has been drained. We know what it means for the wine to run out. Sooner or later in every situation, in every lucky streak, in every relationship, in every type of human pleasure, the wine runs out. Our family members, one by one, leave the nest. Divorce or separation may come even after years of a happy married life. Our friends, with whom we've shared so many enjoyable times, slowly move away. Our motivation to work and to produce is soon replaced with fatigue and burn out. In the parish, the exodus of the young, and the gradual decline of the BECs seem to signal the death of a once vibrant community. In every human achievement, pleasure, and joy — the "wine" is bound to run out.

What do all these experiences tell us? Have we truly run out of wine? Has the party ended? Or are these scenarios merely pointing to the fact that we are often dictated by our subjective experiences, especially our emotions? It is interesting to note that our assessment of any situation is often dictated by our subjective experience. “How do I feel?” This is quite natural. The problem is that we often assume that our subjective assessment is conclusive and infallible. But our feelings say more about ourselves than objective realities. We confuse our emotional urges for the voice of conscience. In any event, emotions are always beyond our control and they never last. This kind of wine is inevitably doomed to run out.

Thousands of years ago, the people of Israel also thought that the destruction of their country meant the end of everything. They were mocked by their neighbours as the “Forsaken” and “Abandoned” People. Israel had only herself to blame for this due to her infidelity. But Isaiah in the first reading gives an entirely different ending to the story, an objective one as far as it is the vision of God. It is a message of hope. All is not lost because God will return to redeem them. They will be called by a new name; they will be called “My Delight” and “The Wedded” for God has taken delight in them again. God has renewed His covenant with them – He has wedded them again. What brought about this change? They finally realised that glory and blessings come from God alone. No human power, riches or glory will last. Eventually all these things will run out except that which is given by God.

Our most common folly is that we often realise this important point only too late, after our own resources have been depleted or exhausted. In our drunken merriment, self-absorbed in our own human achievements, we often fail to recognise that Christ is the true source of joy, an inexhaustible and irrevocable joy, unless we choose to ignore Him. He is not only the provider of the wine that will never run out. He is the Best Wine often mistakenly kept for the last.

Thus, we must guard against the deception of subjective assessment and be misled into thinking that this is the end, merely on the basis that we feel it is so. When we allow our subjective impressions to dictate our lives, it would only lead to chaos and confusion. Here, our Catholic understanding of the Sacraments is important. Sacramental theology speaks of an objective reality, which is the grace we receive in the Sacraments, that is not dependent on our subjective experience or our emotions. Christ is present, truly, really, substantially at every Mass and in the tabernacle whether you “feel” it or not. The truth that Christ is present here is a fact. Your feelings do not matter. “Facts have no feelings!”

Likewise, even when the parties to the marriage no longer feel anything for the other, this does not spell the end of the marriage. The subjective experience of the parties does not determine the end of the objective reality proposed by the sacrament. Objectively, Christ remains faithful; He continues to confer the necessary grace through the Sacrament of matrimony, and this ultimately defines the permanency of the marital bond. In another instance, even if everyone in the congregation felt listless and bored during the entire mass, or the priest was ill-prepared to celebrate the mass, the mass is still objectively the Sacrifice of the Cross. As the fate of marriages cannot be determined by changing sentiment, the victory of the Cross is not undone by our fluctuating moods.

So, what do we do when the wine runs out? What do we do when the thrill is gone? What do we do when the faith dissipates? Many look for substitutes, only to find themselves disappointed once again because the wine will also run out. ‘Running away’ is no solution too. Mary shows us the way. The strength of Mary’s faith is when she tells the servants to follow the instructions of her Son. We run to Jesus with faith that He can do even the impossible, even outmatching the miracle of transforming water into wine. Mary teaches us to come to Him in humble submission, ready to listen to what He has to tell us, even though it may go against our better judgment. So, when the wine runs out, don’t attempt to brew some more, don’t look for cheap alternatives and don't run away. It’s not over. The best wine has been saved for the last – it is Jesus.

Blessed is she

Fourth Sunday of Advent Year C

If you pray the Holy Rosary regularly, you would immediately recognise that the Joyful Mystery of Mary’s Visitation to her cousin Elizabeth comes immediately after the Annunciation and before the Nativity of our Lord, Christmas. It is therefore not surprising to have the gospel for this Sunday focusing on this story of the meeting of these two women. But more importantly, it was the first meeting between the sons they were carrying within their wombs, the cousins Jesus and John the Baptist. And less the audience were to forget them as they nestled not so quietly within their mothers’ wombs, hidden and off-camera, the text throws light on them to ensure that we do not forget that the entire story would be theirs, and less of their mothers.

Elizabeth would take on a prophetic role by announcing what is really taking place behind the scene. The hand of God is at work even as mortals play out the drama of human relations and emotions. Elizabeth inspired by the Holy Spirit declares and pronounces a series of blessings - two addressed to Mary, and one to the child within her womb. This is not the Beatitude of the Sermon on the Mount found in Matthew’s gospel nor the set found in the Sermon on the plain in Luke’s. Nevertheless, Elizabeth uses the Greek word which also translates into “happy” which we would find in both sets of beatitudes - makarios. Here it is translated as “blessed.”

“Makarios” was derived from two root words: “mak”, to become large, and “charis”, grace. For, one who is blessed has been enlarged, or magnified, by grace. It was, therefore, a word reserved for the elite, and then only the crème de la crème. During the classical Greek era, makarios described the status of the gods, emphasising their power and wealth. At times, it also described the state of the dead, since through death they had now arrived at the world of the gods. They were beyond the cares and worries common to the living, and now enjoyed the company of the gods. But during our Lord’s era, the word makarios was used to describe those who had everything money could buy – those who lived like the gods. They were enjoying the personal satisfaction of their achievements, the height of socio-economic status, the best political connections, and the wealth of enduring and enriching personal relationships. Makarios was the supreme blessing. It was synonymous with all the joys of the life hereafter. Thus, it was not a descriptive term thrown around lightly.

And now Elizabeth uses this very concept in various ways.

Firstly, in referring to Mary as most blessed among all women. The Old Testament mentions and even sings praises of several of these women and the gospel of St Matthew even intertwines some of their names into the patrilineal genealogy of our Lord. But Mary stands out among all these women. The next part of Elizabeth’s announcement would give the reason for Mary’s supreme blessedness.

Elizabeth now declares the child within Mary’s womb as “blessed” too but not in the way as Mary is blessed. The blessedness of Mary is ascribed to her by God as it is announced by the Angel Gabriel at the Annunciation. In both the Annunciation and here in the Visitation, Mary is declared to be the mother of the Lord, the Most High God. God is not just blessed or the source of blessedness. The only one truly blessed in Himself is God and Jesus is the incarnate makarios, worthy to receive the threefold declaration of the angels, “holy, holy, holy.”

Elizabeth would conclude her prophetic outburst with a final makarios: “blessed is she who believed that the promise made her by the Lord would be fulfilled.” It is by virtue of her faith and her obedience that Mary is hailed as blessed. The faith of Mary is a light for the whole world, and which will not be put out by night. She was and is a woman of incredible faith, who believed the prophets and trusted the angelic messengers, even when the message seemed beyond human credibility. In this, she serves as an example for us. For, she stands under the promise, even when that promise seems definitively thwarted by the forces of evil. It is under this third use of the word of “Makarios” that we can share in Mary’s blessedness. We too are blessed when we believe in the promises of God, and act upon them.

This is how we should prepare ourselves in the next few days leading up to the great feast of Christmas. We have truly been “blessed”, our grace has been enlarged, our hearts have been emboldened, our hope has been renewed, knowing that the Lord is on His way, not just to visit us but to be one with us, united with us in body and soul, sharing with us His divinity as He humbly shared in our humanity. Instead of all the bad news we may be hearing these days, let the greetings of this holy season bring such joy and peace to us so that we too may leap with joy as the Baptist did in his mother’s womb. And just as Mary believed God, and so Jesus Christ took flesh within her, at this Mass, let us not doubt that Jesus Christ is going to take flesh once more in the Blessed Sacrament and enter each one of us as He entered the body of His Blessed Mother. Let’s ask for the faith truly to believe that this is so—that through this Eucharist, Christ’s Body is united to ours. If we believe in the fulfilment of the promise made to us that He is truly really and substantially present, we are indeed blessed!

The Second Pascha

Solemnity of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary

Today, Roman Catholics throughout the world celebrate the great Solemnity of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary. Our brothers and sisters from the Eastern Christian tradition, on the other hand, celebrate the event as the Dormition, or falling-asleep, of the Holy Theotokos, the Mother of God. From ancient times, this event has been regarded by Orthodox Christians in the light of a second Pascha, or a second Easter. Thus, the Assumption finds its true glorious meaning in the revealing radiance of the Easter dawning sun.

The Resurrection of Christ, the Holy Pascha, is THE pivotal turning point in the story of humanity’s salvation. With His resurrection, Jesus Christ trampled upon the gates of Hades, released its prisoners from the clutches of death and the devil, and opened for us the gates of paradise, which was originally intended for man - the crown of all creation, and which became closed to us because of the sin of pride and disobedience to God on the part of our ancestors. What man lost through Adam, he has regained through the second Adam. God Himself chose to come down to earth, became incarnate in the form of man, and once again opened to us the gates of paradise, having manifested - instead of pride - the greatest humility, instead of disobedience - complete obedience even unto death on the cross, and instead of sin, He - the most pure and absolutely sinless - took upon Himself the burden of all the sins of the world. With these three qualities - humility, obedience and purity of nature - the Lord showed us the highest example of what man can be like, of what he should be like, and of what the Creator intended him to be.

However, we may well be tempted to think that only God incarnate could be such an ideal man, while a mere mortal could never attain such perfection. But to show us the error of such thinking, we have before us the Mother of God, who is the highest example of the attainment of such perfection, and who teaches us with her entire life, her death and her Assumption that man can attain perfection precisely by means of these three qualities - humility, obedience to the will of God, and moral purity. Her Assumption is evidence and proof of such a life. Mary is indeed the first fruit of the new humanity, the creature in whom the mystery of Christ – His Incarnation, death, Resurrection and Ascension into Heaven – has already fully taken effect, redeeming her from death and conveying her, body and soul, to the Kingdom of immortal life. In the Assumption of Our Lady, it is these three qualities of hers which are commemorated - humility, obedience and purity, - which have elevated her, a mere mortal, above all earthly creatures and above the entire heavenly host.

As in all other feasts of Mary, we do less to honour her but in reality worship the Sovereign Lord who fulfilled His plan of salvation through His humble maid, the most supremely perfect among His creatures. In this area, the Fathers of the Church have often used the method of scriptural typology to speak of Mary’s relation to Christ. Typology is a special kind of symbolism. When we say that someone is a type of Christ, we are saying that a person in the Old Testament behaves in a way that corresponds to Jesus’ character or actions in the New Testament. For example, in the second reading, Paul describes Adam as a type of Christ. Though death entered this world through the first Adam’s disobedience, eternal life was made accessible again through the obedience of the second Adam, Jesus Christ himself.

If Adam is a type of Christ, Eve is a type of Mary. The Fathers of the Church often spoke of Mary as the new Eve. St John Chrysostom, the great Doctor of the East spoke of how the garden of Eden was closed forever to our parents through the disobedience of Adam and Eve, but now the gates of Paradise, Heaven has been opened to the one who showed perfect obedience, Mary, the Mother of God and Our Beloved Mother. Where Eve listened to the deceptive voice of the serpent, a fallen angel, which caused humanity’s fall, Mary listened to the revealing and liberating Word of God, communicated through an angel of God, and became the instrument of bringing man’s cause of salvation into the world, her son our Lord Jesus. As a result of the fall, the serpent would constantly strike at the heel of the children of Eve but the ancient serpent, now a dragon in the Book of Apocalypse, will be deprived of victory over the Lady who defeats the foe of the Church. Death and pain became the fate of our first mother because of the folly of sin, eternal life would be the prize won for our Blessed Mother because of her faithfulness to the will of God.

One may be tempted to ask: Isn’t the story of the Paschal Mystery, Christ’s death and resurrection sufficient? The answer is ‘Yes.’ But as the story of Adam is incomplete without the mention of Eve, the story of the new Adam would be similarly incomplete without speaking of His new counterpart. If Jesus, the new Adam, is the primary cause of humanity’s salvation, then Mary, the new Eve, is the primary representative of redeemed humanity in displaying the effect of Jesus’ redemptive work. If the old Eve followed the old Adam into exile after the Fall, the new Eve followed the new Adam in suffering, in the Passion, and so too in definitive joy of the resurrection. Christ is the first fruits but His risen flesh is inseparable from that of His earthly Mother, Mary. In Mary all humanity is involved in the Assumption to God, and together with her all creation, whose groans and sufferings, St Paul tells us, are the birth-pangs of the new humanity.

Mary’s Assumption shows the Way – it is Christ who has saved her from the moment of her conception in her mother’s womb and it is Christ whose redemption has preserved her body from corruption and now leads her to heaven. The Mother leads us to her Son, the Second Pascha casts further light on the first, the fidelity, humility and purity of the New Eve reflects the perfect model of the New Adam. Mary shows us the way to heaven through her Assumption.

Today, as we raise our eyes above and through our imagination try to behold the splendour of this wondrous event of our Blessed Mother being assumed body and soul into heaven into the welcoming arms of the Holy Trinity in the presence of the angelic hosts and saintly choir, our vision looks beyond the person of Mary. The Assumption provides us with a glimpse of our future glory, our final home, the holy beatitude of heaven. Pope Benedict speaks to us of the power of this feast as one which “impels us to lift our gaze to Heaven; not to a heaven consisting of abstract ideas or even an imaginary heaven created by art, but the Heaven of true reality which is God himself. God is Heaven. He is our destination, the destination and the eternal dwelling place from which we come and for which we are striving.”

Kinship and Discipleship

Tenth Sunday in Ordinary Time Year B

One of the most colourful English expressions to describe a person who is out of his mind is “a sandwich short of a picnic.” Don’t attempt to wrap your head around this. What is pertinent in this description is the metaphor of a sandwich. In today’s gospel passage, although our attention is immediately focused on the heated argument between our Lord and His antagonists on the latter’s accusation that He is performing miracles with the power of demons, this is our first opportunity to see one of Mark’s sandwiches. Here, we begin with a story about our Lord’s family and end with another story about His family, while sandwiched in between is the story of Jesus and His conflict with the scribes.

The upper loaf of the sandwich begins with the story of how the family of Jesus wishes to take control of Him because they were of the opinion that He was “out of his mind.” Perhaps, one of the most painful experiences is to be accused by one’s loved ones as being insane. Those closest to our Lord tried to put a claim of control on Him because they thought He had gone crazy. This is a startling reminder that proximity to Jesus is not enough; allegiance to Jesus is what matters. That is what marks the followers of Jesus. It is striking that they want to silence Him, because He had just silenced the demons.

The scribes, a group of our Lord’s strongest critics, jumped at the opportunity to attack our Lord by accusing Him of being possessed by the Prince of Demons, Beelzebul. Mental illness in ancient times was a sure sign of possession. They were confident that this time their accusation would stick since our Lord’s own family had turned against Him and had become the prosecution’s star witnesses. The evidence is clear - the miraculous actions of our Lord preclude a natural explanation. There can only be two sources - it is either divine or demonic. The scribes don’t deny the supernatural power; they just redefine its source.

Our Lord then exposes the fallacy of their accusation and skewed reasoning by asking this logical question: “How can Satan cast out Satan?” It’s a rhetorical question because our Lord doesn’t wait for the answer from His attackers, He provides it. If our Lord is actually using or being used by demons, then wouldn’t such a civil war in the demonic realm lead to their ultimate destruction. That would be preposterous.

Our Lord proceeds to give the right interpretation. There is not a civil war from within but a direct invasion from without— from heaven itself. This is a heavenly war. Satan’s kingdom is not being built; it is being plundered. Someone stronger has come - God Himself. And Satan (the strong man) has been “tied up” and now his house is being plundered. Jesus the King, the Lord of all that has been and all that will come, and no one, certainly not the ruler of the demons can stand up to Him. He cannot bind Jesus—Jesus binds him and plunders his house.

Rejecting our Lord has now led the scribes to commit a sin that has eternal consequences: blasphemy against the Holy Spirit. The blasphemy or sin against the Holy Spirit is saying that Jesus has an unclean spirit. They are saying that Jesus is motivated by evil rather than good, by an unclean spirit, rather than by the Holy Spirit. It is an unforgivable sin because they are rejecting the very gift of salvation which is being offered to them by the Lord. In this sense, they are the people Isaiah warned about: “Woe to those who call evil good and good evil, who put darkness for light and light for darkness” (Isaiah 5:20). This is a stunning irony.

We have reached a fork in the road: One road leads to life and the other, to death. The Pharisees charge Jesus with blasphemy (Mark 2:7, and now Jesus charges them with blasphemy. No neutrality is possible. Someone is blaspheming—either Jesus or the Jewish leaders. Which side will we take?

Thankfully the answer is given by none other than the family of Jesus. At the start of this story, they misunderstand His intentions and believe Him to be mad. They who are supposed to be “insiders” prove themselves to be “outsiders.” But at the end of this passage, we can detect a transformation, though subtle. Jesus provides the true criterion of discipleship: “Anyone who does the will of God, that person is my brother and sister and mother.”

This is where the Catholic interpretation takes an entirely different tangent from that of Protestants. For Protestants, our Lord’s words are putting Mary in her place, that is putting her down. But for Catholics, this is a clear affirmation of Our Lady’s esteemed position as our Lord’s most favoured disciple.

The clue is to be found in what our Lord meant by “family”: “who are my mother and brothers?” Who is our Lord’s true family. Once again, we are forced to decide the meaning of this word, as we were forced to decide on the source of His power - is He speaking of His earthly family or heavenly one? The Lord does not call us to simply belong to an earthly family. He comes to adopt us into His Heavenly family. For those hearing His teachings, He comes to adopt those into the household of our Heavenly Father.

So, back to our riddle. Did the Lord push aside His mother Mary when He says the words in this passage? Listen to what Jesus says, “Anyone who does the will of God, that person is my brother and sister and mother”. What does Mary say at the end of the Annunciation? “Let it be done to me according to thy word … according to thy Will!” Mary is the only one who declares so freely and openly that she is willing, and she does the will of God the Father. There can be no better candidate who meets this criterion of discipleship. So, it’s true that in one sense, our Lord is putting Mary “in her place”. It just happens that her “place” is as His mother not just by virtue of blood but more importantly in faith.

A slice of bread does not make a complete sandwich. You need two slices, two perspectives - one as a starting point and another as an ending. The truth of the matter is that sometimes we do behave like the family of Jesus at the beginning of the story trying to take charge of our lives by taking charge of our God. But this is a lie, the very same lie sold to our first parents which caused them to be expelled from paradise. We have to learn the painful lesson that no one can take charge of God. He is in control. He is the One who subdues, not the one who is subdued. It is we who must be subdued, who must submit willingly and lovingly to His will. Mary provides us with the perfect example of this. Only then, can we attain our true identity as members of God’s heavenly family and “that when the tent that we live in on earth is folded up, there is a house built by God for us, an everlasting home not made by human hands, in the heavens.”

The Woman who bore God

Solemnity of Mary Mother of God

The first set of visitors to the bedside of the Blessed Virgin Mary after the birth of our Lord would have been most unexpected. Rather than kings or prophets or the aristocratic priestly caste coming to pay homage to the new born King of Kings, the gospel tells us that it was a motley crew of poor shepherds who were the first visitors, a group of people whose profession would have even been looked down by others because of their lowly state and the frequent association of their kind with petty thieves and others who engage in unsavoury work. But this would not be surprising if we knew our Scripture. God Himself had promised to shepherd His people through the prophecies of the prophets of old. So, shouldn’t the first ones to recognise this ominous event be the ones who would be most like this Shepherd King in the flesh? Birds of a feather do indeed flock together!

The Blessed Virgin Mary would have had a sense of this. She did not feel insulted by the presence of these shepherds nor withdraw in fear. She welcomed them and the message of the angels which they brought: “Today in the town of David a saviour has been born to you; he is Christ the Lord”. And St Luke tells us that “she treasured all these things and pondered them in her heart.” To ponder and to enter into deep reflexion is one thing, but to “treasure” is on an entirely different level of appreciation.

In that tight space of a hollowed-out cave with little room for anything else than the animals who were stabled there, the Holy Family took refuge and the Word spoken at Creation and who brought the universe into existence was born and laid in a manger, a humble feeding trough for the animals. The space was crowded enough before the arrival of the guests. And yet that space was large enough to house the animals, the Holy Family and the shepherds who had come to worship the Saviour born that day. Once the Virgin Mary contained the Uncontainable, and her womb became more spacious than the heavens, the small grotto of Bethlehem has expanded to such a degree that it now houses true worshippers like the most cavernous basilica! We do not feel cramped here! We may feel cramped at church during the midnight service, but not here.

The Son of God was born on earth, yet He was not separated from heaven. He is babbling like an infant in the arms of His Mother and giving commands to the archangels and angels concurrently. It is precisely for this reason, that we affirm the title of His mother as Mother of God, or in Greek, Theotokos which literally means “God-Bearer,” the one who gave birth to God. This title was solemnly defined by the Council of Ephesus in 431 (although it has been widely used for centuries earlier) to mean that in the person of Jesus Christ, His humanity and divinity are inseparable. Jesus cannot be split up into two parts, one divine and the other human. This means that Mary cannot be simply the mother of the human Jesus without being also, in a genuine sense, the Mother of God.

The first Christians called Mary the “Mother of God” without hesitation. There was scriptural precedent, and it seemed logical. If Jesus was God, and Mary was his mother, then that made her the Mother of God. That sort of logic depends on a principle called the “Communication of Idioms.” According to that principle, whatever one says about either of Christ’s natures, can be truly said of Christ Himself. That’s because His two natures, the divine nature and the human nature, were united in Him. He is one divine person.

In the fifth century, however, some people raised the same objections to the title that many non-Catholics raise today: They argued that the title “Mother of God” implied that Mary was the “originator of God.” Those objectors said that they could accept the title “Mother of Christ,” but not “Mother of God.” At the heart of those objections, however, was an objection to the unity of Christ’s two natures. Mary, they claimed, gave birth only to Christ’s human nature, not His divine nature. The Church, led by Pope Celestine I and St. Cyril of Alexandria, disagreed. As St. Cyril pointed out, a mother gives birth to a person, not a nature. And the bishops at the Council of Ephesus sided with them and rejected the duality of natures proposed by Nestorius and his camp who could not come around to call Mary Mother of God.

Accordingly, Mary gave birth to Jesus Christ, who was and is a divine person. Although Mary did not “originate” or “generate” God, she did bear Him in her womb and give birth to Him. Mary did not give Jesus His divine nature or His divine personhood—those He possessed from all eternity as the only begotten Son of the Father. But she also didn’t just give Him His flesh: She gave birth to the whole person. She gave birth to Jesus Christ, both God and man. For this reason, we should not hesitate to acknowledge that Mary was God’s mother.

So, as we continue to spend time in prayer and meditation at the Christmas creche to honour the Saviour of the World, let us not forget His mother who stands watchful by His side. Together, with her, let us treasure all these things and ponder them in our hearts.

A Sweet Yoke of Harmony

Solemnity of the Holy Family

One of the most iconic Catholic traditions of Christmas is the Christmas crèche, or the nativity scene. This year marks the 800th anniversary of the first crèche which was erected in the year 1223 by none other than St Francis of Assisi. St Francis’ pioneering crèche featured real animals and a real family, not resin or plastic figurines. The crèche was St Francis’ attempt at bringing Bethlehem to our doorsteps as it was no longer safe for pilgrims to make a journey to the Holy Land to visit the holy shrines. You may agree that this year seems to feel like déjà vu, especially for those who had planned to make a pilgrimage to the Holy Land this year or the next, only to find their plans cancelled or changed due to the outbreak of war in Israel. So, rest assured. Even if you cannot experience the Holy Land physically, you have a chance to experience it liturgically during the season of Christmas… or in your homes.

The Christmas crèche is not like any other Christmas decoration. In fact, it’s not meant to be a decoration. It is a prayer corner. Here, we are invited to prayerfully contemplate the various figurines contained within the scene, the members of the Holy Family at its very heart and centre. And so, we see the humble figures of Mary and Joseph kneeling before the manger gazing lovingly upon their newborn son, the Son of Mary, the Son of God. One could say that this must be one of the most ancient family portraits. The whole scene reaffirms two wonderful truths. The first reminds us of God’s immense trust for this couple, that He would deign it fitting to entrust His only Son to two human beings, a woman and a man, wife and husband. The second is that if a family was the cause of humanity’s downfall, another family would be at the heart of humanity’s redemption.

Joseph and Mary’s family life were far from ordinary or even ideal, by modern standards. The beginnings of their married and family life were already marked by disastrous omens – a suggestion of conception out of wedlock, the threat of divorce, dislocation and homelessness, economic poverty and to top it all - a hostile environment that posed the greatest threat to both the safety and welfare of the couple and their newborn child. In today’s world, all these would be interpreted as unfavourable factors that would warrant either delaying the marriage, postponing the start of a family, calling it quits or even justify the abortion of the foetus within the womb. In fact, it would take much less these days to justify any of the above actions. But something amazing took place. Instead of turning their backs on each other and on the child, Mary’s fiat and Joseph’s acceptance of the Incarnation – indeed the man and woman’s loving obedience to God’s will, triumphed at the end. Their love for God, which outweighed self-interests and societal pressures, served as the wellspring for their own steadfast love and provided a rich sanctuary for the Christ Child.

Mary and Joseph were both significant and necessary influences in the life of Jesus – a child needs both his father and his mother. Mary and Joseph remained side-by-side, nurturing and protecting the Son of God as He “grew in wisdom.” Yet Scripture hints that they are asked to play distinctive roles. Mary watches and listens to all the wondrous events that accompany the birth of her Son. After the visit of the shepherds and Magi, we see the natural contemplative in the person of Mary who “treasured all these words and pondered them in her heart.” Joseph, for his part, receives messages from angels, who direct him to take action to protect his family. His readiness and courage to respond immediately without hesitation proved his manliness and reaffirmed his paternal qualities. Joseph was never the absent father. His humility shines forth through his willingness to be obedient to God’s will. In Joseph, we understand that truly “being a Man”, is not doing it “my way,” but always obedient to ‘God’s ways.’

Thus, these figures assembled in the Nativity scene, call us back not only to the mystery of the Incarnation, to the joyous event of Christmas, but to the very origins of creation itself. We come to recognise that the crown of God’s creation after He set in place all fixtures and wonders of the universe is not just man alone, but a man, both male and female, made in the image of God, and entrusted with the first commandment to come together in marriage and to form a family. What does it mean, though, that man as male and female has been created in the image and likeness of God? This simple verse in the Bible affirms that both male and female, while fully equal as the image of God, are nonetheless distinct in the manner of their possession of the image of God. This is what we call the complementarity of man and woman. Therefore, family itself becomes a sign that points to the very wellspring of love, the Holy Trinity – One God in Three Persons. The family is an icon of the Most Holy Trinity.

The necessity of celebrating such a feast where the family is the focus is more apparent today when we consider how counter cultural marriage and family life have become. Contemporary culture is challenging the most vital aspects of the existence of the human being, in ways that go so far as to overturn our understanding of human nature, and particularly of human sexual identity and relations between the sexes. Contemporary culture is proposing and imposing models for sexual identity and relations between the sexes that would ultimately mean redefining marriage and the family, to the extent of destroying both. Contemporary culture cannot accept that man is made in the image and likeness of God. Contemporary culture has no place for God and His kind. Man must be his own god, or nothing else matters. For this reason, contemporary society has no place for the traditional family because the family and the mutual obligations of its members remind our society of God and His demands of us.

Today, with the Holy Family as our model, we must reaffirm once again that the complementarity of man and woman is at the root of marriage, not prideful autonomy, not self-serving motives seeking to satisfy one’s personal happiness. Thus, when we arbitrarily decide to take either the man, husband and father, or woman, wife, and mother out of the equation of marriage and family, it would have destructive consequences. For the Incarnation to take place, for the Word to take flesh, the Son of God must have a human father and human mother. In the human family of Joseph and Mary, we see again how God brings the Divine into the human realm.

The Blessed Virgin Mary and St Joseph, the woman and man who wait before the manger in our homes and in our churches, affirm the beauty of this daily path of married love — this school of virtue — and they testify against “the culture of the temporary,” which Pope Francis said, has wreaked the most havoc in poor communities. Therefore, the feast we celebrate today is so important to reaffirm once again the beautiful original plan of God at creation, a plan that is not subject to the fleeting changes of fad and fashion, precisely because God had “forged the covenant of marriage as a sweet yoke of harmony and an unbreakable bond of peace” (Preface for Marriage). In the nuptial blessings contained in the Wedding liturgy, we are comforted by the promise that the blessings endowed by God on marriage and family life is “not forfeited by original sin nor washed away by the flood.” May the Nativity figures of the Blessed Virgin Mary, St Joseph and the Christ Child in our little prayer corner inspire us to foster and embrace the distinctive gifts we share in our marriages and families and spur us to help others, especially families in crisis, see their own salvation in the steadfast love of the Holy Family.

There can be no Christmas without Mary

Fourth Sunday of Advent Year B

When most people are asked, when does the Church commemorate this momentous event in salvation history where the Uncreated Word became flesh, the most common answer would be: “Christmas!” Christmas is the feast of the Incarnation. But I guess most people, especially in this day and age when abortion is widely promoted in many countries, we have forgotten that life does not begin at birth but at the conception of a person. One could choose to deny this on ideological grounds because it is inconvenient and challenges our selfish motives, but this truth is irrefutable when we witness a convergence of biology and theology which affirms this truth.

So, on this last Sunday of Advent, and in fact for this year at least, the last day of Advent, before we transition into the Christmas cycle this evening, the Church’s lectionary provides us with this beautiful gospel passage which narrates the Annunciation of the Archangel Gabriel to the Blessed Virgin Mother of our Lord Jesus Christ. The connexion between these two events - the moment of conception and the moment of birth - could not be made any clearer with the juxtaposition of these two events. The Feast of the Annunciation which the Church celebrates on the 25th of March is as much the Feast of the Incarnation as it could be said of Christmas.

A cursory reading of both the first reading and the gospel will let you see how the prophecy of Nathan to King David in the Old Testament that his house and sovereignty will always stand secure and his throne be established for ever, is being fulfilled in the story of the Annunciation, as explained by the Archangel Gabriel: “The Lord God will give him the throne of his ancestor David; he will rule over the House of Jacob for ever and his reign will have no end.”

In Hebrew, there is no specific word for a king’s palace or the Temple of God. The palace of the king is simply described as the King’s house as the temple is God’s house. So, the idea of “house” is deliberately ambiguous when spoken in reference to David as it could refer to both the dynastic line of David or to the palace in which he lives. Furthermore, in the first reading we see an ironic reversal in that God promises to establish a house for David even as David promises to build a house for God, an offer which God declines. David, ashamed that he was now living in an opulent “house,” would not allow God to suffer the humiliation of occupying a nomad’s tent. He thought to honour God by building God a house fitting for His glory and dignity. But God reminds David that since God has provided the latter with all the essentials of accommodation, God Himself is in no need of a human dwelling. No human hands can build a house that is ultimately suitable for God save for one that is built by God Himself. Even King David acknowledges this in Psalm 127: “unless the LORD builds the house, those who build it labour in vain.”

Mary is indeed the house of God, not built by human hands but shaped and created by God Himself. Our Eastern brethren pays her the greatest honour by describing her as the one “made more spacious than the heavens” or in Greek, “Playtera ton ouranon.” The Universe we know about is mind-bogglingly big. Yet, we recognise that God is far greater than that. The universe, for all its vastness, remains finite. God, on the other hand, is infinite! But here is the great mystery we celebrate today – God who could not be contained in His created universe chose to be contained in the tiny womb of this human being. Thus, we call Our Lady “more Spacious than the Heavens” because she held in her womb Him who holds the whole universe. She succeeds where the whole universe fails.

The veil which separated the Holy of Holies from the rest of the Temple Complex was embroidered with symbols of the cosmos, in a way indicating that the temple was a microcosm of the universe, the house of God. When the veil was torn in two on Good Friday at our Lord’s death, it was symbolically the end of the cosmos as we know it. During the time of our Lord’s birth, the temple was already an empty husk, the ark of the covenant, the throne of God, had already been lost during the Babylonian invasion and the first destruction of the Temple. Furthermore, in the mystical vision of the prophet Ezekiel, the shekinah, or God’s visible glory, had already departed. But here, we see the glory of God, the Holy Spirit and the power of the Most High will once again overshadow the “house” of God, not the Temple but Mary - she who is the ark of the new covenant, she who is more spacious than the universe.

So, on the eve of the day we commemorate how the Author and Creator of the Universe entered into our created universe as a child, it is fitting that the Church reminds us of how this happened. It was not by accident, nor is the instrument by which this occurred insignificant. Without Mary’s fiat to the Archangel Gabriel, we would not be celebrating Christmas. There is no Christmas without Mary.

Mary is indeed a cosmos to herself with Christ as its solar centre. Mary is indispensable to the story of salvation and the story of Christmas because without her, Christ’s birth could not have taken place. The pre-existent Word could not have become flesh if not for her fiat. Christ could not have been born without her free consent. The Mother of God, she who is “made more spacious than the heavens,” stands between the heavens and the earth and serves as a bridge between. Let us therefore ascend to the heavenly heights and enter into the Holy of Holies. Let us go up to the mountain of the Lord, the Heavenly Jerusalem, for Our Lady, the Blessed Virgin Mary, the true House of God has already bridged what was previously impassable. Through her co-mediation, she has allowed us to approach what was previously unapproachable and to comprehend what was previously incomprehensible. Let us take her hand as she leads us to the manger and beyond to the cross.

The Ark of the New Covenant

Solemnity of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary

In the first reading, we are presented with that climactic confrontation between two seemingly poorly matched opponents. In one corner we have the cosmically enormous dragon that is able to sweep away the constellations and galaxies with its tail and in the other corner, a picture of abject haplessness and vulnerability, a pregnant woman in labour, notwithstanding that she is adorned with the sun, crowned with stars and is standing on the moon. If you were a bettor in the audience, you would put your every dollar on the lizard rather than the latter. This scene is so captivating that we often pay little attention or ignore entirely the paragraph that introduces this scene. Let me reread it if you have missed it: “The sanctuary of God in heaven opened and the ark of the covenant could be seen inside it.”

This line seems unconnected with what follows and yet it is the very clue which introduces the following scene of the battle. The note that the “sanctuary of God in heaven opened” is a summary of the Book of Apocalypse - this is the awaited moment of revelation, a glimpse of hidden heavenly realities in the midst of the turmoil and chaos we are experiencing in this world. What is being revealed to us? It is the ark of the covenant! But what has the ark to do with the lady in the next scene? More importantly, what has the ark to do with today’s feast of our Lady, the Blessed Virgin Mary and her Assumption?

Before we answer this burning question, let us now turn to the Gospel. In telling us the story of Jesus Christ, Luke presents Mary as our role model, the first Christian. But he drops hints to indicate something more. Mary is overshadowed by the power of the Holy Spirit when she conceives Jesus. Elizabeth questions, “Why should I be honoured with a visit from the mother of my Lord?” Mary stays in the hill country of Judah for three months. In the Old Testament, one item is overshadowed by the cloud of God’s Spirit. It is the Ark of the Covenant. Elizabeth’s question echoes that of King David when he hesitated to bring the ark into Jerusalem, “How can the ark of the Lord come to me?” and so, he leaves the ark for three months in the hill country of Judah.

It’s easy to miss the parallel between the Ark of the Old Covenant as the dwelling place of God, and Mary as the new dwelling place of God. You see the Ark of the Covenant, strange as it may be, is a type or a prefiguration of Mary. God loved His people and wanted to be close to them. He chose to do so in a very special way and so God instructed Moses to build a tabernacle. Within the tabernacle he was to place an ark made of acacia wood covered with gold inside and out, and within it was placed a golden jar holding the manna, Aaron’s rod that budded, and the stone tablets of the covenant. In the Ark of the Old Covenant, God came to His people with a spiritual presence, but in Mary, the Ark of the New Covenant, God comes to dwell with His people not only spiritually but physically, in the womb of a Jewish girl.

Notice the amazing parallels: In the ark was the law of God inscribed in stone; in Mary’s womb was the Word of God in the flesh. In the ark was the urn of manna, the bread from heaven that kept God’s people alive in the wilderness; in Mary’s womb is the Bread of Life come down from heaven that brings Eternal Life. In the ark was the rod of Aaron, the proof of true priesthood; in Mary’s womb is the true High Priest. No wonder St. Gregory the Wonder Worker said that Mary is truly an ark—"gold within and gold without, and she has received in her womb all the treasures of the sanctuary."

You can clearly see how the Ark of the Covenant is tied to Mary’s role and identity, but it still doesn’t answer the question: what has this to do with her Assumption? The Temple, the sacred place of Israel’s worship and the dwelling place of God, is no longer. When the Temple was destroyed, the Ark of the Covenant was lost. By the time of the Third Temple, Herod’s Temple, the building was merely an empty shell and the inner chamber called the Holy of Holies where the ark used to be housed was now vacant. But there is a new dwelling place of God. Scripture affirms that Jesus is the New Temple—the place where God and humans meet is Jesus (John 1:14; 2:22). Jesus, after His resurrection, ascended into heaven. The Lord sits in heaven “at the right hand of the Father.” But the Temple would not be complete, it would only be a hollow shell of a building, without its most defining content - the ark of the covenant.

The Virgin Mary, the new Ark of the Covenant, could not be separated from the dwelling place of the Most High. Just as Israel longed to carry the Ark to the holy city, where it could be placed in the temple, the new Ark must be taken to the presence of God. She who bore the presence of God into the world, would herself be taken into His presence once and for all.

So, the scene described in the first paragraph of our first reading is not just an editorial prelude to the battle scene between the dragon and the mysterious lady. The former scene provides the necessary interpretation for the latter. Mary, the woman adorned with the Sun, crowned with stars and standing on a moon is an apocalypse, a revelation, of that very ark of the covenant which is now brought up to the sanctuary of heaven.

As the Ark of the New Covenant assumes its rightful place in heaven, we celebrate that Christ has given us victory over death. Before we receive the bread from heaven from the hands of the priest who acts in the person of Christ once again, we will declare together that we believe in the resurrection of our bodies and our life in the world to come. What assurance can we have that this is true? Well, Mary, the New Ark of the Covenant is proof of this. It is not only her spiritual soul which is taken up to heaven but her body too - for that same body was the tabernacle which contained not just symbols or representations of God. The tabernacle of her womb contained God Himself. As St Augustine rightly sang her praises: “Him whom the heavens cannot contain, the womb of one woman bore.” For that reason, it is not hyperbole, that Mary, the new Ark of the Covenant, is larger than the heavens.