Behold others as brothers and sisters in Christ, and behold all in love

Father Perry D. Leiker, pastor.

A reflection on the daily readings for the Memorial of the Blessed Virgin Mary, Mother of the Church, by Father Perry.

By Father Perry D. Leiker, pastor

There are options among the readings today, and they seem to take us all over the place.

We begin with the garden scene and the results of the “eating of the apple.”

Shame enters the picture — shame of innocent nakedness.

Blame enters the picture — “it was the serpent’s fault.”

Punishment enters the picture — or perhaps more correctly — “consequences.”

Or Acts takes us to the scene after the Ascension and focuses us briefly on the 11 gathered with some women and Mary, the Mother of Jesus.

Her special place is regarded by all.

And the Gospel spells that out with Jesus’ words from the cross: “Woman, behold your son.”

And to the disciple, John: “Behold, your mother.”

That is how Jesus saw it. That is how Jesus sees them. And that is how Jesus sees us.

We are to behold others as brothers and sisters to us, to Christ, and to behold all in love.

And after saying this, Jesus saw that all was finished. He saw how it was to be and placed the execution of the matter in our hands.

Do we behold as we were asked by Jesus to behold? And do we recognize that to behold is to hold something or someone in a very intentional way.

That is, to choose to hold. And, of course, since we know so clearly how Jesus said that we are to live always in love, then we know that we are to return to this way of thinking, living, being, and beholding again and again and again and always returning to love.

And we must always remember that all we can do is do it to the best of our ability. And we must also remember that we will never do it perfectly. And we must also remember that it is the road, or better, the way that we chose.

Jesus is our “camino” — the way — that we want to walk, and sometimes do, and promise to keep returning to even when we abruptly or occasionally wander away from it.

We return to walk with and in and through and because of our faith and our love of the Christ.

And, especially since Jesus, on the cross, gave Mary to John and John to Mary and, therefore, Mary to all of us and all of us to her, we can say as the Gospel verse says so beautifully today: “O joyful virgin, who gave birth to the Lord; O blessed Mother of the Church, who nurture us in the Spirit of your Son Jesus Christ!”

Nurture us! Nurture us! Nurture us! Amen!

Father Perry D. Leiker is the 13th pastor of St. Bernard Catholic Church. Reach him at (323) 255-6142. Email Father Perry at pleiker@stbernard-church.com. Follow Father Perry on Twitter: @MrDeano76.