+ There is a long, long history in the church going back as far as St. Augustine and St. Leo the Great, and continuing with the added reflections of multiple popes, even to Pope Francis, giving to the Blessed Virgin Mary various and similar titles like mother of the faithful, of believers, of all those who are reborn in Christ; and also as Mother of the Church.
And so up to the present times, Pope Francis decreed that the Memorial of the Blessed Virgin Mary, Mother of the Church, should be celebrated every year on the Monday after Pentecost.
And so we look at two women that have a strangely biblical connection — Evein the garden; and Mary, the mother of Christ.
One woman draws us into a connection with sin and serpent, and evil and spiritual brokenness that makes us aware of our nakedness and weakness.
The other woman draws us near to the cross, and there we discover her as the mother her own Son gives to there at the cross. The words spoken to Mary and to the disciple John are spoken to you, me, and all —
“Behold your mother.”
And yet at this moment, all the focus was on the Christ, and his dying, his redeeming, and his loving and forgiving.
The optional first reading takes us to the Mount of Olives just after Jesus had been “taken up into heaven” and a short journey back to Jerusalem to that “upper room” where so much significance had entered into the lives of the Twelve — now Eleven. They gathered together with Mary and some women; there, they devoted themselves to prayer.
There they opened their hearts, lives, and their communal spirit to the Spirit of God. And in prayer, they would discover their way along the way; and through now, the risen one who had shown that he was the way, and the truth, and the life.
+ In the decree instituting this memorial to become a part of our liturgical calendar, Cardinal Robert Sarah, perfect (the “head guy”) of the Congregation for Divine Worship, noted the importance of this memorial in this way —
“This celebration will help us to remember that growth in the Christian life must be anchored to the Mystery of the Cross, to the oblation of Christ in the Eucharistic Banquet and to the Mother of the Redeemer and Mother of the Redeemed, the Virgin who makes her offering to God.”
Some have noted, and perhaps rightly so, that Pope Francis saw it particularly important to place this memorial immediately after the celebration of Pentecost — the birthing moment of the church.
For, indeed, who could connect this “birth of the church” for us more pointedly than the one who birthed the Christ himself into this world for us and for all eternity?
The maternal is proclaimed in and through Mary, and she becomes a model and example to us all. Perhaps, we could say that all of us — men and women alike — are called to live our Christian lives and pastor or care for one another as church in the maternal way of Mary, with a distinctly maternal love.
And the Gospel verse for today echoes softly and distinctly in and through us —
Alleluia, alleluia. O joyful Virgin, who gave birth to the Lord; O blessed Mother of the Church, who nurture in us the Spirit of your Son Jesus Christ! Alleluia, alleluia.
