Solemnity of Mary, the Holy Mother of God – 1 January
The Octave of Christmas falls on New Year’s Day. Given the
fact that the pagans used to celebrate this day through dissolute activities
and superstition, the ancient Church helped believers begin the new year with a
“new spirit” through the practice of days of fasting and penance. In 431,
during the Council of Ephesus that concluded on 22 June, the dogma of faith
regarding “Mary’s divine maternity” was declared. Thus, in 1931, on the
Council’s 15th centenary, Pope Pius XI established the liturgical feast
that we already find celebrated in the 7th century. It is a day laden with
meaning and contains many messages: the Octave of Christmas recalls the day
Jesus was circumcised and given His name, it is the Solemnity of Mary, the
Mother of God, and it is also the day on which the World Day of Peace is
celebrated (established by Pope Saint Paul VI in 1968).
There truly are many messages to be received on this first day of the year. We
are invited to learn from the Virgin Mary to “keep” the Word in our hearts, and
to ask ourselves what the Lord Jesus wants to say to us as the days go by,
knowing that God’s blessing always accompanies us, as the First Reading from
Numbers reminds us.
The shepherds went in haste to Bethlehem and found Mary and
Joseph, and the infant lying in the manger. When they saw this, they made known
the message that had been told them about this child. All who heard it were
amazed by what had been told them by the shepherds. And Mary kept all these
things, reflecting on them in her heart. Then the shepherds returned,
glorifying and praising God for all they had heard and seen, just as it had
been told to them. When eight days were completed for his circumcision, he was
named Jesus, the name given him by the angel before he was conceived in the
womb (Lk. 2:16-21).
The birth of the Child in Bethlehem.
Luke’s text does not recount anything striking. The unique and
central event that he could have recounted has already taken place—the birth of
the Child the angels had announced as Savior and Christ, the Lord (Lk. 2:11).
We heard that Gospel during the Mass at Dawn on Christmas Day.
The Shepherds and the peripheries of the world.
The first people the angels brought their tidings to were
shepherds. They were the first who “went in haste” (Lk 2:16), running to the
stable to “see this thing that has taken place” (Lk. 2:15). As we saw on
Christmas, Jesus was not born in Jerusalem. Let us not forget that John the
Baptist would later preach in the desert and the people went out to him, not to
the temple in Jerusalem (Gospel of the Second Sunday of Advent). Since the
first to come were shepherds, we can see in them representatives of other
excluded types: sinners, those who had to maintain a distance. These were the
people towards whom Jesus would manifest particular attention to the point that
Jesus would respond: “I have not come for the healthy, but for the sick; I have
not come for the righteous, but for sinners” (cf. Mt. 9:13; consistent with 1
Sam. 16:1-13 and the call of King David who was with the sheep). The shepherds
arrived at the stable, saw the Baby and “made known the message that had been
told them” (Lk. 2:17).
A race and a celebration.
As we think of the shepherds going in haste toward the stable,
we can recall Mary’s “haste” (Lk. 1:39) to reach her cousin Elizabeth after the
angel’s annunciation, and her exultant canticle, the Magnificat. The
shepherds too, were “amazed” and they “returned, glorifying and praising God
for all they had heard and seen” (Lk. 2:20). We could almost say that the
shepherds became angels, bearing to others the glad tidings they themselves had
received, since they cannot keep it to themselves. The Apostle John would later
write: “That which … we have heard … seen with our eyes, which we have looked
upon … we proclaim also to you” (cf. 1 Jn. 1:1-3). These words echo and prolong
the words of Psalm 18: “The heavens declare the glory of God…” (cf. Ps. 18). Today, these joyful tidings have reached us too, through generations of
“angels” who have handed it down from “one generation to another”. Whoever
meets Jesus’ gaze (cf. Mt 4:12-23) and is attracted by His Love cannot but
bring others to Him. A bearer of good news is completely involved even through
his or her own life. Saint Francis of Assisi used to say: “Always preach the
Gospel, and if necessary, use words” (Franciscan Sources, 43), making it
understood that words are extra. What counts is that our lives speak.
Mary, the Theotokos.
Mary is the Mother of God because she is the Mother of Jesus,
true God and true Man. Because of this, she more than anyone else can lead us
to her Son, for no other like her knows who Jesus is, and no one knows how to
relate with Him as well as she does. Mary is the Mother who, on hearing the
shepherd’s words, understood immediately that the Child was not just “her Son”.
“My mother and my brothers are those who hear the word of God and put it into
practice” Jesus would say one day (Lk. 8:19-21). She, who for nine months had
borne Him in her womb, knew how to listen to everyone the Lord allowed her to
meet: the shepherds, the magi, Simeon and Anna…because each of them would
“reveal” something about Jesus’ identity and mission.
Prayer:
We fly to your protection,
O Holy Mother of God;
Do not despise our petitions
in our necessities,
but deliver us always
from every danger,
O Glorious and Blessed Virgin.
Jonathan Fabian Ginunggil,
Most High Servant,
Jesus, Mary, Joseph Ministry of Love
(Blessed and Saints and the Nine Choirs of Angels)
No comments:
Post a Comment