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Daily Scripture

+ Feast of the Birth of Mary

We have the best and the worst among our ancestors>

We know that all things work for good for those who love God, who are called according to his purpose. [Romans 8:28]

You will recognize the gospel passage as the one we usually avoid, assuming it has nothing to offer contemporary Christians. However, it does have a purpose beyond tracing the lineage of Jesus to David. It is not a scientific genealogy so don’t attempt to ‘prove’ it scientifically.

It’s a mixed bag at best. There are saints and sinners among the list but they are all ancestors of Jesus through Mary. It’s odd that on this feast of the birth of Mary that we read the genealogy of Joseph because it is through Joseph not Mary that Jesus is connected to David.

I suppose we are all connected at least spiritually. The late great Seton Hall professor and convert to Christianity, Msgr. Osteriecher, used to remind us frequently that we are all spiritual Semites, i.e., we are Judeo-Christians and therefore trace our lineage through David to Abraham.

And that’s why we claim Mary as our spiritual mother. Indeed, she is.

Beyond that, it’s good for us to be reminded that few if any of us are of pure breed. We often refer to our family as a “Heinz 57” family because like the food brand, we have at least 57 different nationalities among our ancestors, not all of them saints, to be sure. But whenever we got together for a ‘family’ event, we were one. I hosted the last family reunion at St. Joseph several years ago for over 200 relatives comprising four generations.

It’s never too late to give thanks for our heritage.

Feast of the Assumption

Friday August 15, 2008

She made it; so can we!

It’s a happy coincidence this is the patronal feast for our parish. It is also significant because Mary seems to be attracting the attention of many Catholics from the left and from the right. I suppose that puts Mary right in the center of the parish and in the center of the Church where she ought to be.

The feast is not about the technology of her passage into heaven but about the completion of her mission on this earth. From the very first moment of her conception it was her destiny to partner with God and to live with God forever. Her acceptance of that call to mother the Christ and to adopt humanity as a spiritual mother was her unique vocation. She embraced her calling without hesitation or equivocation. To the Angel Gabriel, she replied, “Let it be done to me according to your word.”

Mary’s destiny is our destiny too. Although never as exalted as her call, we too were destined from the very first moment of our conception to become partners with God—to allow the seed of God’s Word to take root in our hearts in Christ. In that sense, we all ‘mother’ Christ into our world through our words and deeds. That’s what discipleship is all about. In another sense, as spiritual daughters and sons of Mary, we became in baptism, adopted sons and daughters of God, sisters and brothers of Christ. Of course this is a spiritual reality that is solidly based on traditional Catholic theology. It is our destiny to live with God in Christ forever.

This is not to suggest in any way that we are worthy of the call or that we will ever be able to achieve our destiny on our own. In truth life is a precious gift. Nothing we can achieve on our own is accomplished without grace. We are no different from Mary in this regard.

The other insight that came to me as I reflected on the feast is the fact that as Christians, we are totally absorbed—mind, body and spirit—into the life of Christ. We are spiritual but not spiritualists. The Olympics amply demonstrate for me the magnificent blend of body and spirit. Even the opening ceremonies that exalted the human body could not detract from the subtle spiritual context of the event even in a city that does not recognize its life in God. In fact, the human body exalts the soul of God as much as it does humanity. Mary’s response to her cousin Elizabeth in the ‘Magnificat’ celebrates the enfleshment of the divine Spirit: “My soul glorifies the Lord and my Spirit rejoices in God my Savior.”

In the light of current events at home and abroad and in the face of attempts to distort or destroy what God has created as good, we do well to celebrate the gift of our humanity and the beauty of human life. As Christians we are challenged to give witness to human potential as empowered by divine grace. It’s a good combination and brings to mind once more the sentiments of the Late Cardinal Bernardin in his now classic pastoral letter on life, “The Seamless Garment.”

In his deep respect for human life, he challenged not only Catholics in his own Archdiocese of Chicago, but believers everywhere to put an end to the culture of death that stifles human hope and accept instead the empowering gift of God’s enobling spirit which energizes human potential for good.

As partners with God, children of Mary, brothers and sisters in Christ, we are committed to life in all its forms—in the womb and on death row; the quality of life in ghettoes and back streets of our cities or in poverty pockets in Appalachia; on the battle front among warring nations and in the care of the environment and ecosystems that constitute our legacy to our children and grandchildren.

The greatest testimony we can give to one another and to our world it the testimony of a life lived in complete harmony with the human spirit at one with God.