The Gospel today tells us that Mary pondered all these things in her heart. What were these things that Mary pondered if not the events of salvation that were unfolding before her very own eyes. To celebrate the solemnity of Mary, the Mother of God is a call for us to participate in this act of pondering the events of salvation that are unfolding before our own eyes.
Our own personal experiences of life are not a mere series of events strung together. Our struggles have worth and meaning before God. He honors our struggles and seeks to compliment it by the assurance of his presence. Mary teaches us the importance of responding to God’s offer of grace with an emphatic ‘yes’ even in the face of the obscurity and uncertainties of our personal lives.
No one’s personal story including its joys and sorrows is ever beyond the reach of the arms of such a loving mother, but it is our responsibility to accept such an embrace. This holy place in which we have gathered is like the womb of Mary from which Christ took his birth in human history and it is up to us to bring that same life which takes place here in our midst out into the world around us.
As a symbol of Mary Holy Mother Church offers us all her riches when she calls us to the banquet table of the Lord where intoxicated by his own great love Jesus was willing to lay down his life as a sacrifice for each of us to make sacred and holy the life history of each of us gathered here. Mary teaches us that every human life is connected. Her choice to be open to God was fully her choice and we are gathered in faith here at this moment to worship our God and redeemer because Mary used her freedom to create room in the inn of her immaculate heart when the world in its sinfulness refused to give birth to such a child of grace and truth. Through the responsible use of her freedom Mary has prepared here on earth the banquet table of heaven from which we must be fed if we would live eternally.
Each time that we gather within the walls of this holy building its sacred arms reach out to us like our Mother Mary seeking to draw us into her bosom where resting next to her heart symbolized by the altar we encounter her son Jesus Christ who becomes broken for us in the Eucharist so as to make our own brokenness meaningful and sacred.
Jesus is the Great Historian not because he is good with remembering names and dates and events that have occurred within history, which obviously he does but rather because he is able to transform them in his love.
Like Mary, Holy Mother Church gives birth to Jesus Christ in all who call upon her as mother with a sincere heart. It is therefore in this holy mothers embrace that we experience Jesus as the One who has the power to transform our own individual struggle to overcome sin and live a life of grace.
As we embark upon this New Year the Gospel and the example of Mary, the mother of God calls us to open our personal lives to the mystery of God’s presence in the concrete reality of life. He seeks to transform our brokenness, he seeks to deliver us from those things by which we are held captive. Mary’s response of faith to God whose desire it was to enter the messiness of human life should be our response as well for Jesus Christ eagerly desires to enter our lives in the depths of our woundedness in order to heal us.
We must be careful on this journey not to make gods out of our experiences, which could lead us to believe well I’ve been this way for years, or I’ve tried to break that bad habit and nothing has ever changed. This kind of reliance upon past experience however reliable can limit the true power of God to release us from our captivity. The power of the solemnity, which we are celebrating proclaims loud and clear that the reliability of our own experiences can fall flat on the floor in the face of the power of God.
We may feel pride for certain accomplishments in life and shame or guilt over other things we have done but the truth is, with God the impossible becomes possible as He comes to save us through Mary’s cooperation and in our own day through Holy Mother Church of which
Mary is a symbol we too can if we are willing becomes cooperators in God’s divine plan of salvation.
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