Typically, the 15th of September, i.e. the day after we celebrate the feast of the Exaltation of the Holy Cross on the 14th of the same month, is when we commemorate the memory of Our Lady of Sorrows. We do not commemorate it this year because following the reforms after the Vatican Council II we do not allow Sunday, the day when we commemorate the Resurrection of the Lord, to be superseded by other memorials or feasts.
And yet, and yet, when the lectionary of the day is so full of the reference to the Cross, can Our Lady – who shared in the passion of Our Lord, Her Son – be far behind? If one reads the lectionary of the day closely, we realise that we can perceive the figure of Our Lady, patiently standing by Her Son, even beneath the Cross, and offering us a model through which we can deepen our faith and grow closer to Her Son.
The first reading is from the book of Isaiah, and more particularly contains portions of what we call the third song of the suffering servant. The suffering servant that Isaiah prophesies, is of course Christ, the servant who responded to the call of the Master, to save the Father’s people, but is cruelly treated by those He has come to save. Listen:
I gave my back to those who beat me,
my cheeks to those who plucked my beard;
my face I did not shield
from buffets and spitting.
Now this is clearly a reference to the passion of Our Lord, his cruel treatment at the hands of the servants of the High Priest. But immediately before these verses, are verses that can just as easily be understood to be referencing Our Lady:
The Lord GOD opens my ear that I may hear;
and I have not rebelled,
have not turned back.
Our Lady was given special graces by God so that She could eventually be the Mother of God. She was conceived immaculately, that is, without stain of original sin. She was allowed to grow in holiness. In other words, the Lord God opened her ear that she may hear. And when she did hear, the call of the angel Gabriel who announced to Her that she would be the Mother of God, and asked Her consent: She did not rebel, and did not turn back. On the contrary, she responded, with faith in Her God: “I am the handmaid of the Lord. Be it done unto me, according to thy word,” or in Latin: “Ecce Ancilla Domini. Fiat mihi secundum verbum tuum”
This Fiat was repeated by Our Lady through the rest of Her life, and Her seven sorrows are evidence of her renewals of Her fiat – at the Prophecy of Simeon (Luke 2:34-35), at the Flight into Egypt (Matthew 2:13-21), at the Loss of Jesus for Three Days (Luke 2:41-50), at the Carrying of the Cross (John 19:17), at the Crucifixion of Our Lord (John19:18-30), when Jesus Taken Down from the Cross (John 19:39-40), and finally when Jesus Laid in the Tomb (John 19:39-42).
What is unique about these fiats, however, is that they were done silently. St Philip Neri would often advise his followers to love to be unknown (amare nesciri). And our Lady was skilled at this virtue and the Gospel today bears (silent) witness to this virtue.
The episode in the Gospel today begins with the phrase “Jesus and his disciples set out.” Now we should know that Our Lady would have been there with the disciples. So when Our Lord teaches:
that the Son of Man must suffer greatly
and be rejected by the elders, the chief priests, and the scribes,
and be killed, and rise after three days
Our Lady is present in the congregation. She listens, and this news must break Her immaculate heart, but what does She do? She remains silent and she does not rebel, she does not turn back. Rather, She denies Herself, takes up Her cross, and follows Him, Her Son. The protest does not come from the Mother, who has the greatest right over the unmarried son, but from Peter.
In the second reading St. James says:
Demonstrate your faith to me without works,
and I will demonstrate my faith to you from my works.
Our Lady demonstrated Her faith through Her works. Her works were not loud and noisy, but silent and constant, reiterating her fiat through Her entire life; and bear in mind that she consented to be on this earth even after Her son had ascended into heaven. My dear brothers and sisters, this quiet following of Christ, and the carrying of Our Cross, is in fact the life of many Christians who are the unsung saints of the Church. The wife, or husband, who suffer silently so that their children may benefit from the combined presence of father and mother; the religious who bear injustice, and ingratitude, so that they may continue to serve God and His Church through their vocation; those who work a job that will bring in money, rather than the job they would like to do. The actions of the unsung saint, those who love to be unknown, are actions like those of Our Blessed Mother, who played the side show silently, so that we may be saved. In times of crises, like Our Lord, and indeed like Our Lady, they pray:
The Lord GOD is my help,
therefore I am not disgraced
See, the Lord GOD is my help;
who will prove me wrong?
They say this quietly, because they trust in His promise: that no matter the trials we have to face now, we will walk before the Lord in the land of the living.
Let us, on this Sunday, therefore, my dear brothers and sisters, make our own the words of St Paul, which would very well have been those of Our Lady, even as she stood under the Cross of Her Son:
May I never boast except in the cross of our Lord
through which the world has been crucified to me and I to the world.
(A version of this homily was first preached to the faithful on 15 September at the parish of Our Lady of the Rosary, Fatorda.
Image reference: 'The Lamentation,' Ludovico Carracci, 1582, The Metropolitan Museum, New York. )
No comments:
Post a Comment