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 -  The Word - 

Feast of “Mary, Mother of God” (January 1st)

Isn't this a scandalous title to call someone "Mother of God"? Can there be something more preposterous than that? This is one of the baits thrown by today's mushrooming sects in front of ill prepared Catholics. What are we saying when we call Mary, the "Mother of God"?

Interestingly, this very ancient title given to Mary, had really everything to do with Christ. The Council of Ephesus from which this title stems, was concerned with proclaiming the divinity of Christ. Was Jesus truly God? This was the point at issue and not some misguided search for high-sounding titles for one of God's creatures.

If Jesus is true God and true man, then we can in all simplicity revere His mother as the Mother of God. If, out of all the infinite possibilities open to God, Divine wisdom chose this way of achieving man's redemption (through the true humanity of Christ), who are we to suggest better courses of action?

Christian piety, led by the Holy Spirit, has always sensed this point. It never turned Mary into an object of adoration or in any way equated her with Jesus. But Mary has retained a privileged place in the hearts and minds of the believer. What is the very special (though subordinate) role?

Simply this: that in God's mysterious plan she had this unique, irrepeatable call to become the Mother of Jesus and thus collaborate in the work of Redemption and that she remains our best model of faith, while remaining a woman and a mother, not an abstraction or a rival to God.

Model? Mary is, to an exquisite degree, what each of us is to lesser degrees a sacrament, a mediator, a member of the family of saints.

That is, each of us is a visible sign of God's love (sacrament), a channel of His care and concern (a mediator), a member of the great family of God (the communion of saints). This triple truth is best seen in Mary. Looking at her, we get a resplendent summary of what it means to be Christian. God saves us, works in us through one another. We are not unloved individuals lost in an unfriendly universe. We belong together.

Today's feast ("Mother of God”) highlights a very special aspect of this call - the call to “bear and bring forth” God. It certainly reminds us of the dignity of women and of the inestimable value of motherhood the prime “sacrament” through which God's love reached us first. Beyond this, it challenges us to think what "life" and "given life" are all about. If we only give life to another at the level of the flesh, we are little better than animals. Human parenting means much more than procreation and providing food and shelter. When we bring up or children to act reasonably, to think, to forgive, to be creative, we help them to become human.

But there is more to life than even this, as Mary's life reminds us.

Like her, we are called to be "God bearers" - to focus our love and our energies on God's will and allow His Word to become flesh to become visible, tangible, human.

May this simple woman, whom the Spirit transformed into most faithful of believers, teach us how to listen to God and say "Yes". May our "Yes" be as total and as life giving as Mary's. May our flesh our humanity show the world that God is indeed among us.

Readings: Numbers 6:22 - 27; Galatians 4:4 - 7; Luke 2:16 - 21.

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