To speak of “Mother of God” could lead us into the theological problems that this designation entails, e.g. if God had a mother, then God has been created.
But to enter into this topic would be more of a theological lecture than a reflection.
That is why I thought of dividing this moment into 4 blocks.
1 – Mary, woman of the Word:
Is it possible for God to choose someone who has no faith? Yes, of course it is possible because God chooses each and every one of his children, but what is not possible is that someone who does not have faith can hear the voice of God.
Any of us can recognise the voice and even the sounds made by the person who lives with us. My mother, for example, could recognise by the sound of the door which of my brothers or I was coming back from dancing. Because when you spend a lot of time with someone you are able to recognise them, even if you don’t see them.
We can say of Mary that she really spent a lot of time with God, simply because she was able to recognise him, to know how to “hear his voice” in everyday life.
But how is it possible for Mary to recognise him? One of the situations is her family. Mary must have heard the story of the People of God in Egypt, she must have known the laws of the Lord because her parents taught them to her. She was also part of a Believing Community. We can understand that the people of Israel, even in their unfaithfulness, sought and believed in God. But, beyond these situations, in their words and attitudes we can contemplate the depth of the Word of God in their lives. The Magnificat is a synthesis of how the Word of God was a daily part of her life. Mary was used to listening to God, she had a heart in “practice” for the encounter.
Who among us can say that listening to the Word of God and recognising it as such is a simple matter?
Any of us who are part of Consecrated Life understand that this is difficult enough, otherwise why do people ask us so many questions? Why is it that when they meet us they don’t understand our way of life? Simply because it doesn’t fit into the “usual”.
But also, how many times have we ourselves asked ourselves whether what we felt was truly the Word of God or our word?
Knowing how to discern that Word takes us our whole life, because it is always new, dynamic, alive.
Only those who are capable of seeking this encounter with the Lord, as Mary did, will be able to recognise his Word and make it come alive.
2 – Mary, the woman of Yes
We can know Mary as the woman of Yes, who, on hearing the Lord’s proposal to be the Mother of God, immediately responded with a Yes.
But have we thought carefully about this yes?
If the question is: do you want to be the Mother of the Son of God without any relationship with a man, would we think that this is logical? I don’t think so. If a young woman comes to me with such a speech, it is very likely that I would advise her to talk to a psychologist.
This situation, therefore, makes us discover how difficult it could be to believe in such a proposal. Even so, Mary resolves to answer Yes, and this Yes brings with it a series of difficulties.
Mary must undo her life plan in order to adapt herself to God’s plan. She had to break a social and family structure. Let us remember that for them children were a blessing from God, so to accept to be the mother of only one, having the possibility of more, was to go against a culture.
She said Yes knowing that she would be killed for it. There was no alternative but stoning, and even knowing that, she decided to say yes.
She says Yes even though, carrying the Saviour, she must give birth in a stable.
Her Yes transforms her into a migrant. She had to leave her home, her family, her country to save her Son.
This first Yes is not the only one that Mary has to pronounce. She has had to accept the will of the Lord throughout her life.
She had to accept that a 7 year old boy would tell her that he was taking care of his Father’s business instead of playing with other children.
He had to say Yes when his Son, who was in danger or being frowned upon by society, tells him that his mother and siblings are the ones who do God’s will.
She even had to say Yes when she saw her Son being tortured and hung on the cross and, even more, she had to accept his death.
She had to say Yes in the expectation of the Resurrection, because she trusted that the God who put her Son in her arms would not take him away from her now.
He said Yes in the midst of a community in fear or disillusionment, waiting for the support of the Holy Spirit.
With all this, we can understand that Mary’s Yes was not simply one and not even easy.
This is the model of the Christian Yes. A Yes that involves our whole life, in fear, in misunderstanding, in difficulty, in death?
We may think, in Consecrated Life, that our first Yes is already enough and that this Yes leads us to the complete acceptance of any new proposal of God, but the truth is that it is not. Each Yes is a test, each moment of our life is particular and different and many times we will have the desire to say “no today”.
Today I no longer want this community. Today I don’t want to let a person’s love pass me by. Today I don’t want to continue to make an effort without being recognised. Today I can’t deal with my own life any more.
And even if we say “No”, the Lord will continue to seek us out and will continue to propose something new to us in order to provoke us to say “Yes” again.
In this, Mary continues to be a school and an example, in her ability to say Yes to each of the Lord’s proposals.
3 – Mary and the Incarnation
We can say that in every woman who becomes a mother there are two clear moments:
- Physical motherhood
- Motherhood of the heart
These two do not necessarily go together. The woman who adopts decides to be a mother from the heart, even if her physical condition does not allow her to do so. Just like the woman who aborts, she had the physical possibility of being a mother, but her heart does not allow her to do so.
If we try to imagine what came first in Mary’s life, we may come to the conclusion that she was first a mother of the heart.
She first receives a proposal from the angel, which she meditates on and, even without fully understanding, accepts. Therefore she first receives Jesus in her heart and from this acceptance the conception is possible.
God deals with our freedom, he needs it in order to act, which is why Mary’s acceptance is fundamental.
Mary is then, above all things, mother of the heart.
The world reproaches us, even if today there is a rejection of life, that Religious Life does not accept motherhood or fatherhood. In reality, we are called, like Mary, to be “Mother of the Lord”, to accept Him and carry Him in our hearts, to care for Him and His message, to make Him grow in us. We are called to “incarnate Jesus in our lives”.
Only a heart that is free and empty of everything will be able to receive something as great as the Lord. Therefore, it is necessary, not only an acceptance of words, but also of life, of attitudes, of “space”. It leads us to empty ourselves in order to be filled, which often implies a renunciation of everything that is not of God.
4 – Mary, Mother God
According to John the Evangelist, “the Word became flesh”. The eternal Word of the Father took on a mortal body to be part of our lives, to walk with us and to give us salvation.
It is Mary who carries this Word of the Father in her and shares it with the whole of humanity. Mary’s Son is given to mankind, she carries him in her womb to bring joy to her cousin and gives birth to him so that this light may reach everyone.
The generosity of this woman must have been so great to be able to give us what she loved most, her Son.
Mary visits us with the Joy of the Gospel, because that Joy is none other than Jesus himself. She does not give birth to a son for herself, she gives birth to a Son for the world.
The Church calls Mary the first Missionary and it is from this logic that we can say that this is so.
There is no biblical story where Mary is not linked to it and where in one way or another she does not share it.
Pope Francis, from the very beginning, spoke to us about not being bearers of a “vinegar face”, in a certain way he knew how to pick up the thoughts of many people who see in us a suffering Church, a Church where smiles and joy are not possible.
When a mother gives birth to a child, the whole family is filled with joy. Perhaps we should ask ourselves whether we are giving birth today or whether we are closing ourselves off from the life of God.
The world is full of pain, hopelessness and emptiness, it is we who must become “mothers” to soothe, fill or simply regain joy.
If our message, our life, our community does not bring all this about, it is because we have not yet learned from Mary what it means to be the Mother of God.
P. Hugo Vera CM
