20th Sunday Year A - Homily 7

Homily 7 - 2023

We celebrated Mary’s Assumption last Tuesday, remembering her transition from this life to eternal life finally face-to-face with God and once more with her Son Jesus — a destiny to which we are all similarly called. Since we were unable to celebrate Mass in our country churches, I want to share a few thoughts about Mary today.

Popular devotion over the centuries has tended to emphasise the difference of Mary somewhat from us, yet the Church has sought to encourage us to see her not only as our mother in grace but also as the “model Disciple” and to draw inspiration from her. As Jesus was like us in all things but sin, we can say something similar of Mary. Mary was fully, wonderfully human.

Unfortunately the Gospels tell us very little about Mary’s life. But if we look hard, there is still so much we can learn.

The first thing a Gospel told us of her was the Angel Gabriel’s greeting to her of: “Hail”. Sadly, the translation is so inadequate. Gabriel communicated more to her than that. The greeting is better translated as “Rejoice”. And Mary took the invitation very much to heart.

Luke’s picture of her in those early experiences of her pregnancy seem to show her bursting with joy. The first thing she did was impulsively to hasten off over the Judean hills to greet Elizabeth — her older, but surprisingly also pregnant, cousin — and to stay with her for three months. And what a meeting that was! Elizabeth was immediately filled with the Spirit, and like, some of the Hebrew prophetesses of old, she loudly and confidently shouted aloud how thrilled she was with Mary’s presence. She shared with Mary how the unborn John the Baptist, still growing in her womb, had amazingly “leapt with joy”. Mary’s joy was irresistibly contagious!

The same prophetic Spirit of God that filled Elizabeth then filled Mary; and like Elizabeth before her and indeed like Miriam, the sister of Moses and prophetess herself, Mary burst into joyful song praising God:

My soul proclaims the greatness of the Lord
and my spirit rejoices in God my saviour.

She realised that her utterly unique role gave her every reason to be joyful — as she sang:

God has looked upon his handmaid …
The Almighty has done great things for me.

Her joy was the overflow of God’s joy.

She could not but sing:

Holy is God’s name,
and God’s mercy reaches from age to age for those who fear him.

It is fascinating to take note of what it was about God that thrilled Mary so much:

He has shown the power of his arm,
He has routed the proud of heart.
He has pulled down princes from their thrones and exalted the lowly.
The hungry he has filled with good things, the rich sent empty away.
He has come to the help of Israel his servant, mindful of his mercy…

Mary’s God and Mary herself lived in the real world, and cared about the real world.

The irrepressible joy of Mary, the brand-new mother, had a similar effect on the shepherds who, when Jesus was eventually born, came to see her and her new-born child. Luke’s Gospel recorded that they “went home glorifying and praising God”, their hearts, too, filled with a joy to be “shared by the whole people”.

As Jesus came to “grow in wisdom and age and grace” over the years, we know few details of Mary’s involvement in his life, beyond what Luke commented about her habitual tendency “to treasure” what she observed and “to ponder it in her heart”. No doubt she kept it up.

I have constantly to challenge myself now whether I seek to know Mary better and to draw inspiration from her or whether I simply continue to view Mary in the likeness of my own stuck-in-the-mud, uninspiring self.

I wish you “All the best!”on the same quest.