The texts from the Roman Catholic Lectionary today invite us to reflect on salvation history and the impact of Mary’s surrender as Mother of Jesus on our hope for transformation.
The reading from the Book of Revelation is a vision of the Woman and the Dragon.
* [12:1–6] The woman adorned with the sun, the moon, and the stars (images taken from Gn 37:9–10) symbolizes God’s people in the Old and the New Testament. The Israel of old gave birth to the Messiah (Rev 12:5) and then became the new Israel, the church, which suffers persecution by the dragon (Rev 12:6, 13–17); cf. Is 50:1; 66:7; Jer 50:12. This corresponds to a widespread myth throughout the ancient world that a goddess pregnant with a savior was pursued by a horrible monster; by miraculous intervention, she bore a son who then killed the monster.1
The psalm today is from the Book of Judith.
* [13:12–20] Elements from chaps. 8–9 are echoed here. The assembly of the people at Judith’s return parallels the meeting of the town officials summoned by Judith in 8:10. Uzziah blesses Judith in 8:5 and again in 13:18–20.2
In the Gospel of Luke, Mary Visits Elizabeth.
* [1:45] Blessed are you who believed: Luke portrays Mary as a believer whose faith stands in contrast to the disbelief of Zechariah (Lk 1:20). Mary’s role as believer in the infancy narrative should be seen in connection with the explicit mention of her presence among “those who believed” after the resurrection at the beginning of the Acts of the Apostles (Acts 1:14).3
George Butterfield comments that the second possible first reading is from the Book of Revelation and describes a woman who looks a lot like Our Lady of Guadalupe.
The reading opens with God’s temple in heaven opened and the appearance of the ark of the covenant. And what is this ark of the covenant? It is “a woman clothed with the sun….” Within the ark of the covenant that resided in the Jewish temple, there were three things: manna, the stone tables of the law, and Aaron’s rod that had budded (demonstrating his authority as high priest). Within the womb of the ark of the covenant seen in the heavenly temple was a son, a male child, destined to rule all the nations. Jesus, the manna of life, the Word of God, the one with all authority and power, resided in this ark of the covenant, Our Lady. Upon the birth of this child, the heavens rang out: “Now have salvation and power come, and the Kingdom of our God and the authority of his Anointed.”4
Don Schwager quotes “Mary conceives the Creator of all things,” by an anonymous early author from the Greek church.
"Gabriel flew down from the vault of heaven and came to Nazareth; standing before the virgin Mary, he cried to her, 'Rejoice! You shall conceive a son more ancient than Adam, the Creator of all things and Savior of those who cry to you. Rejoice, pure virgin!' Gabriel brought from heaven good tidings to the Virgin, and he cried out to her, 'Rejoice! You shall conceive him whom the world cannot contain; he shall be contained within your womb. You shall bear him who shone forth from the Father before the morning star!' (Psalm 110:3). "The co-eternal Word of the Father who has no beginning, not being parted from the things on high, has now descended here below, in his boundless love taking pity on fallen humankind. He has assumed the poverty of Adam, clothing himself in a form strange to him." (excerpt from STICHERA OF THE ANNUNCIATION)5
The Word Among Us Meditation on Luke 1:26-38 suggests If we reflect on today’s Gospel reading, we might find striking similarities between Mary’s response to the angel and St. Juan Diego’s response to his vision of Mary on Tepeyac Hill.
When Mary appeared to Juan Diego on a hillside near Mexico City in December 1531, he was startled and afraid. Again, despite being a man of deep faith, he probably had not anticipated something like this. But just as the angel Gabriel did with Mary, Our Lady reassured him. “Am I not here” she asked him in his own language, “I who am your mother?” And like Mary, Juan Diego said yes. He went to the archbishop to request that a chapel be built on the very spot where she appeared. When the archbishop asked for a sign, roses appeared in winter on that same hillside. Juan Diego gathered them into his tilma to show the archbishop, and when he opened it, the roses tumbled out, leaving a miraculous image of Mary on the cloak.6
Friar Jude Winkler shares the connection between Mary and the Ark of the Covenant in Revelation. On a second level, the woman in Revelation is the Church persecuted and connects to the love of God shown on the Cross. Friar Jude suggests some of the struggles of Mary as a young Jewish woman surrendering to the will of God.
John Moffatt SJ from the Hurtado Jesuit Centre in Wapping, East London, examines the role of the relatives of Jesus with whom Luke opens his gospel.
The personal vindication of the barren wife heralds a saving gift for the whole people. Elizabeth carries the prophet who will announce the call to repentance and prepare the way for the Lord. In her sixth month she anticipates that message as she speaks prophetic words of her own to her cousin, recognising her as the ‘Mother of my Lord’. The meeting of the two cousins to help each other in their need is at one level simple and homely; at another, it declares the deeper pattern of God’s work with his people.7
Fr. Richard Rohr, OFM, shares that the virtue of hope, with great irony, is the fruit of a learned capacity to suffer wisely, calmly, and generously. Any form of contemplation is a gradual sinking into this divine fullness where hope lives. This week’s prayer practice is from the remarkably hope-filled book Conversations with God: Two Centuries of Prayers by African Americans. The prayer of Howard Thurman contains an expression of hope.
I Need Thy Sense of the Future
Teach me to know that life is ever
On the side of the future.
Keep alive in me the forward look, the high hope,
The onward surge. Let me not be frozen
Either by the past or the present.
Grant me, O patient Father, Thy sense of the future
Without which all life would sicken and die.8
The transformation that occurred as a result of the encounter with Our Lady of Guadalupe continues the injection of hope into our world through our openness to the Spirit of God.
References
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