BREAKING THE BREAD OF THE WORD (#4)
Fourth Sunday of Advent, Year C – December 21, 2003
BIBLE READINGS
Mi 5:1-4a // Heb 10:5-10 // Lk 1:39-45
Composer and performer Bradley James has put Mother Teresa of Calcutta’s teachings and prayers to music in the internationally acclaimed recording, “Gift of Love: Music to the Words and Prayers of Mother Teresa”. Bradley remembers her teaching: “Mother said we don’t have to go to Calcutta to help the poor; rather, we must help them right in front of us.” He applied this lesson when he encountered a homeless beggar on the streets of San Francisco. Bradley placed some money in his metal cup, then reached out and shook the man’s hand. The recipient gave him a big smile and the two exchanged names and small talk. Bradley recalls: “Then he pulled me a little closer and said, ‘Thanks for the money, but what I really needed was a handshake’.” Cf. Susan Conroy, Our Sunday Visitor, Oct. 19, 2003, p. 17. Indeed, what was remarkable in this incident was not the coin, but the gift of human dignity and the love of Christ that Bradley James brought to the beggar through the handshake and his fraternal presence. In effect, Bradley has replicated in his life and experienced the joyful mystery of the Lord’s visitation (cf. Lk 1:39-45).
The psychiatric therapist Caryll Houselander (1902-1954) remarked: “Sometimes it may seem to us that there is no purpose in our lives, that going day after day for years to this office or that school or factory is nothing else but waste and weariness. But it may be that God has sent us there because, but for us, Christ would not be there. If our being there means that Christ is there, that alone makes it worthwhile. There is clearly one exquisite incident in Our Lady’s advent in which this is clearly seen: the visitation.”
In Luke’s Gospel account of the visitation of Mary to her kinswoman, Elizabeth, he brings together the new mothers-to-be (Lk 1:25, 36), so that both might praise God’s marvelous activity in their lives and that Elizabeth’s child might be presented as the precursor of Mary’s child. Indeed, the meeting of the two expectant mothers has a christological meaning and focus: God’s inauguration in Jesus of the final stage of salvation. The biblical scholar Eugene Maly explains: “John meets Jesus. The Old Testament encounters the New. On that note the Advent season draws to a close. Through these two infants, still in their mothers’ wombs, we are provided with a foretaste of the coming of the Christmas season … John the Baptist plays an important role in Luke’s theology. He is the culmination, the final and climactic representative of the Old Testament message. He closes one period of history and opens the door to another. After our scene, Luke never records a meeting of John and Jesus … The reason for this literary maneuvering on the part of Luke is the arch significance of Jesus. While fulfilling all that went before, he also gives totally new meaning to all that will come after. Jesus, in the brief span of time on this earth, is in reality the canter of all time, of all history.”
The role of Mary is to be understood in the light of this christological focus. Mary takes the initiative in going to Elizabeth’s home. According to the evangelist Luke: “Mary set out and traveled to the hill country in haste to a town of Judah” (Lk 1:39). The Greek phrase translated “in haste” can also mean “deliberately” or “thoughtfully”. E. Maly comments: “While it is naturally proper that the younger woman visit the older one, is Luke perhaps saying, ‘That is Jesus’ work; he is the gift brought to others’?”
The one who brought the saving Lord to Elizabeth’s home is Mary, the Mother of the Lord. She is the “christofora” or the bearer of the good news. The mother of Christ, God’s most beautiful and precious gift to humankind, brings him to John, in the womb of Elizabeth who, filled with the Holy Spirit exclaimed: “And how does this happen to me, that the mother of my Lord should come to me? For at the moment the sound of your greeting reached my ears, the infant in my womb leaped for joy” (Lk 1:43-44). Elizabeth’s question evokes the words of King David when the ark of the covenant was being brought back to Jerusalem: “How can the ark of the Lord come to me?” (II Sam 6:9). According to Jerome Kodell: “The ark symbolized the presence of Yahweh, the God of Israel. Mary’s visit to Elizabeth sanctifies her home with the presence of the Lord.”
The Church, the community of Christian disciples, is called to be the bearer of Christ’s saving love in the here and now. Our ministry today is like that of Mary, the “christofora” or bearer of Christ. But before becoming bearers of Christ, we must let him be formed in us. The “christofora” – the one who bears Christ and brings him as a gift to others – needs to be “christified”.
That we should undergo “christification” in order to carry out the Lord’s “visitation” and Christ-bearing mission can be gleaned from the following remarks of Caryll Houselander: “How lyrical that is, the opening sentence of Saint Luke’s description of the visitation. We can feel the rush of warmth and kindness, the sudden urgency of love that sent that girl hurrying over the hills. Those days in which she rose on that impulse were the days in which Christ was being formed in her; the impulse was his impulse … If Christ is growing in us, if we are at peace, recollected, because we know that however insignificant our life seems to be, from it he is forming himself; if we go with eager will, in haste, to wherever our circumstances compel us, because we believe that he desires to be in that place, we shall find that we are driven more and more to act on the impulse of his love … We must be swift to obey the winged impulses of his love, carrying him to wherever he longs to be: and those who recognize his presence will be stirred, like Elizabeth, with new life.”
(Adapted from the Advent Preface “The Visitation of the Blessed Virgin Mary” and Mary’s Canticle of Praise)
Leader: Father, all-powerful and ever living God,
we do well always and everywhere to give you thanks
through Jesus Christ our Lord.
By your Holy Spirit
you inspired Elizabeth
to reveal the surpassing honor
you have given to the Blessed Virgin Mary.
Mary is rightly hailed as blessed
because she believed in your promise of salvation:
in her act of loving service
she is greeted as mother of the Lord
by the mother of Christ’s herald.
We make our own the canticle of joy
on the lips of God’s Virgin Mother,
and in our lowliness we too proclaim your greatness.
Assembly: My soul proclaims the greatness of the Lord
and my spirit exults in God my savior;
because he has looked upon his lowly handmaid.
Yes, from this day forward all generations will call me blessed,
for the Almighty has done great things for me.
Holy is his name,
and his mercy reaches from age to age for those who fear him.
He has shown the power of his arm,
he has routed the proud of heart.
He has pulled down princes from their thrones and exalted the lowly.
The hungry he has filled with good things, the rich sent empty away.
He has come to the help of Israel his servant, mindful of his mercy
– according to the promise he made to our ancestors –
of his mercy to Abraham and to his descendants for ever.
The following is the bread of the living Word that will nourish us throughout the week. Please memorize it.
“And how does this happen to me, that the mother of my Lord should come to me?” (Lk 1:43)
MARY’S HOUSE
A Catholic Home for Women in Crisis Pregnancy
A Ministry of the Divine Mercy Foundation
1850 Church Lane, San Pablo, CA 94806
Tel. 610-236-0383 // Fax 610-236-0395
Prepared by: Sr. Mary Margaret Tapang, PDDM