Mary
MARY THE CONTEMPLATIVE
Mary the Cotemplative: A Biblical Perspective, Alexander Villa, O.Carm
Carmelites have always considered Mary as their model in the following of Christ. As early as the fourteenth century, the English Carmelite John Baconthorpe wrote a commentary on the Carmelite rule in which he sustains that Carmel is Marian because the Carmelite way, as proposed in our rule, was precisely the spiritual path followed by Mary. Baconthorpe bases his commentary on the biblical scholarship of his time and on stories taken from the apocryphal gospels that in his day were held to be historically true. Some of his considerations are still convincing to the contemporary reader, others seem far-fetched. But the principle underlying his commentary remains true. Carmelites have always believed that their way of life mirrors that of Mary. It was for this reason that they came to regard her as their sister, calling her rather boldly “the Carmelite Virgin”.
I believe that it is possible, even while adhering to contemporary scholarly interpretation of the Gospels, to draw a spiritual portrait of Mary that corresponds very faithfully to the Carmelite way as expressed in our rule. I will concentrate on one characteristic that is admittedly not the only Marian trait presented to us in the Gospels and not even the only value present in our rule. Others may certainly follow different paths in tracing a Carmelite portrait of Mary, but I believe that this is a very promising track to tread: Mary as the one who listens to the Word.
It is Luke who brings out this aspect of Mary’s spirituality. In chapter 8, Luke has the parable of the sower. When Jesus explains it to his disciples, he says that the seed that fell in the good soil “are the ones, who, when they hear the word, hold it fast in an honest and good heart, and bear fruit with patient endurance” (8, 15). The he goes on to tell the disciples to “pay attention to how to listen” (8, 18). At this point, someone tells Jesus that his mother and brothers came to see him. Jesus immediately replies, “My mother and my brothers are those who hear the word of God and do it” (8, 21). Mary and the other relatives of Jesus are here put forward as examples of the seed that fell on good soil. Jesus insists again on this when, as Luke narrates in 11, 27-28, a woman in the crowd praised his mother. In replying, Jesus pointed out that true blessedness lies not in his mother’s physical relationship with him, but rather in her hearing God’s word and obeying it.
This is totally in line with Luke’s overall presentation of Mary. From the very start he presents her listening to God’s word and consenting to it in the annunciation, “Here am I, the servant of the Lord; let it be with me according to your word” (1, 38). Elizabeth then praises her for believing the word that was spoken to her (1, 45).
Later in his infancy narrative, Luke has two annotations of particular importance in this regard. After the shepherds’ visit, he says that “Mary kept all these words and pondered them in her heart” (2, 19), and after the finding of Jesus in the temple, at the very end of the infancy narrative, Luke notes, “His mother retained all these things in her heart” (2,51).
In biblical spirituality a great emphasis is laid on listening and remembering. In the book of Deuteronomy Moses exhorts the Israelites: “Take care and watch yourselves closely, so as neither to forget the things that your eyes have seen nor to let them slip from your mind all the days of your life” (4, 9). God’s works that the biblical authors ask the people to remember are creation, the exodus from Egypt and the other interventions of God in the history of his people. These are works that manifest God’s wisdom and those who ponder them become consequently wise. They start seeing things as God sees them. Moreover, considering God’s past actions, one learns how to respond to God who is still at work in the life of his people.
Mary was Jewish. She was brought up in this spirituality of listening and keeping in mind. What did Mary retain in her heart? Luke tells us that she kept in her heart “all the words” of the shepherds who referred what the angel had told them about the child (2, 18-19). Later, after recounting Jesus’ response to Mary and Joseph when they found him in the temple and how he then followed them obediently to Nazareth, Luke says that Mary “retained all these things”.
So Luke pictures Mary keeping in mind words and deeds relating to the mission of Jesus and pointing to his future. It is clearly not just remembrance, the keeping in mind of recollections from Jesus’ infancy to treasure them nostalgically. It is keeping in mind mysterious words, strange deeds and trying to figure out their significance. This is precisely the meaning of the Greek verb that we translate as “ponder”. It is synballein in Greek, a compound word made up of syn, meaning “with”, and ballein, meaning “to throw”. Synballein then, from which our word “symbol” derives, means to throw together, to put together, to combine various things.
In our case, Mary is putting together what she hears Jesus saying and what others say about him with the message of Gabriel when he announced his conception to her and with the words of Scripture. Thus she followed him day by day, even as she took care of him and educated him with a mother’s love, trying to discover who her son really was. Because as Luke points out, when he narrates how she found Jesus in the temple and what he told her, Mary did not understand his words (2, 50). We may assume that there were other events and words that she did not understand as well. At the presentation at the temple, Luke says that Mary and Joseph were amazed at what Simeon said about Jesus (2,33).
Mary’s life was a pilgrimage of faith, just like ours. She did not see things clearly from the beginning, but she had to learn how to read the signs that God was giving her. Her eyes and ears wide open, Mary was careful not to lose anything, but she retained everything in her heart. In the silence of her inner life she kept pondering everything, putting things together, to discover ever more fully who Jesus was. This was particularly important for her. The more she understood Jesus, the more she understood herself and her mission, since as from the moment she had said, “Here am I, the servant of the Lord; let it be with me according to your word” (1, 38), her life became interwoven with his.
In biblical spirituality, people are asked to keep in mind God’s works so as to keep steadfast when their faith is put to the test. When everything shows that God is far and silent, the remembrance of his past interventions helps them to continue to believe that this time also God will stand by his word. Likewise, Mary’s attitude of keeping everything in her heart and pondering it, prepared her for the test of Jesus’ rejection by his people that reached its climax at his death on the cross. As Simeon had foretold her, a sword would pierce Mary’s soul also (2, 35). But Mary kept the faith and became part of the first Christian community of Jerusalem (cf. Acts 1, 14). The attitude of pondering everything in her heart, which had characterised her pilgrimage of faith, could not but help the early Christian community to delve ever more deeply into the mystery of Christ.
Does this spiritual portrait of Mary find an echo in the Carmelite way? It certainly does. Our Order was founded in the beginning of the thirteenth century as a community of hermit-brothers focused on the Word of God. In fact, the main occupation that Albert of Jerusalem, the author of our rule, envisages for Carmelites is that each “remains in his cell day and night pondering the Law of the Lord and keeping watch in prayer”. Here Albert is quoting Psalm 1, 2. The psalm is a blessing of the righteous person. It describes two opposite “ways”, the way of the righteous and the way of the sinner. The sinner associates with scoffers and follows the advice of the wicked, whereas the righteous finds “his delight in the Law of the Lord, and on his Law he meditates day and night”. The Law (Torah) here as elsewhere in the Bible does not stand simply for precepts and commandments, but is synonymous with divine revelation, God’s Word. The holy person is the one who is familiar with the Word of God, seeking in it a sure guide so that he can say, “Your word is a lamp to my feet and a light to my path” (Ps 119, 105). The Hebrew verb hagah which is used here and which is translated as “meditate” or “ponder”, indicates reading in a low voice, murmuring. It is used in relation both to the Torah (Josh 1, 8) and to God’s works (Ps. 77, 12; 143, 5). It means murmuring and repeating to oneself the Torah or God’s works with the intention of keeping them in mind so as to live by them. This is very close to the Lucan picture of Mary pondering everything in her heart.
In Albert’s age, meditantes (meditating, pondering) had a similar meaning. It was not the mental exercise that we call “meditation”, the type of prayer proposed for example by St Ignatius of Loyola in his Spiritual Exercises. It was the repetitive reading, aloud, of Scripture, until the Word was learnt by heart and got to the centre of the heart. There it becomes prayer, a heart to heart dialogue with God. The classical image for meditation is rumination: you keep chewing the words of Scripture just like the cows do with the food, in order to “bring out the hidden truth of the text” (Guigo the Carthusian). As Augustine says, “The person who hears but then forgets out of negligence is similar to one who swallows what one has heard…. The person who meditates the Law of the Lord day and night is similar to one who chews and savours the word with the palate of the heart” (Enarrationes in Psalmos, Sermo 149; PL 38, 801). Repetition of each phrase, pondering every single word to assimilate the deeper meaning of the text: this was meditation in medieval monastic circles and this how Albert understood it. It is an exercise of the mouth, which murmurs the words, of the memory, which tries to fix them, of the intellect, which strives to understand them, and of the will, which desires to put them into practice.
Nourished by Scripture in this way, it comes natural for the Carmelite to be fortified by reverent reflections or holy thoughts as the rule exhorts him, for the Scriptures “dwell abundantly in his mouth and heart”. In this phrase we have a vivid, almost plastic, description of what Albert orders earlier when he says, “each is to remain in his cell, day and night pondering the Law of the Lord”. This is what meditation meant for Albert and the first generations of Carmelites: that “the Word of God dwells abundantly in your mouth and heart”. You can almost see the hermit-brothers in their cells, mumbling the words of Scripture and savouring them in their hearts. This practice of meditating assiduously the Word of God has a very specific goal. God’s Word is above all the revelation of his will. Therefore the aim of having it in one’s mouth and heart is that “whatever you have to do be done according to the Word of the Lord”, as the rule says.
Perhaps the challenge for us Carmelites today is that we become more aware that God’s Word is not only contained in the Scriptures. God continues to speak to us in the great and small events of our world and in our everyday life. It was precisely there that Mary encountered God’s word as she pondered on what was happening around her in the life of her Son.
Yes, Baconthorpe was right. The Carmelite way is truly Marian. Following her, Carmelites live by the Word of God. They listen to it, believe it, receive it, ponder it and strive to accomplish it.
Mary the Contemplative, Ashley Salima, O.Carm
As one of the models of the Carmelites Order, Mary stands out as a shining beacon, radiating the light of her example to all her Carmelite brothers. Her humble yet warmly felt companionship is always significant in the Order. In this light, the Carmelite way then is the Marian way. The Carmelites’ and even the biblical portrait of Mary depicts a contemplative presence of a faithful mother and an ardent disciple of Jesus Christ. Following after the example of Mary, the Carmelites are compelled to live in allegiance to Jesus Christ and serve him with purity of heart as stipulated in the Carmelite Rule.
Biblically, Mary, as contemplative, is depicted as one who listens to the word with receptivity of heart, and obedience of will. The seed of the mystery of the annunciation though inconceivable to her human mind, fell on the good soil of her believing heart. Mary’s ‘fiat’ should be reiterated by the Carmelites every day, reaffirming their unwavering allegiance to the Jesus. Albert therefore exhorts Carmelites “to remain in their cells or nearby meditating day and night on the Law of the Lord and keeping vigil in prayer…” The word Law (Torah) does not entail commandments only but entails the Word of God. Lectio Divina then becomes a contemplative approach to the Word of God, fortifying Carmelites with holy thoughts.
Luke in his gospel articulates that, “Mary retained all these things in her heart” (2:51). This vividly paints a contemplative portrait of Mary. In like manner, the contemporary world needs a contemplative presence, which is slow to voice out yet efficacious when it does. This aspect of Mary’s character is a wake-up call to embrace daily events with a big heart, to have big listening ears and a small mouth. Mary the contemplative calls Carmelites to unusual degree of discernment, and to have a free spirit as they tread on their Carmelite path.
MARY & SPIRITUALITY
A phrase like “Marian Spirituality” is enough to make some people uneasy. Is there not just one spirituality, namely Christian? The issue is not only extremely important but also somewhat complex.
There is a growing literature on the theme of Mary and spirituality.1 But we need to be alert to several approaches and aspects of the theme. Spirituality is a word that has become quite chameleon: it takes on a different hue when used about various schools or movements identified by a period, place, or institution (e.g. desert, medieval, Dominican, French spiritualities). It is applied to the appropriate response of various stats of life (e.g. single, married, clerical, religious spiritualities); it can mean a focus on some aspect or revelation of the Church’s life or it can draw attention to the life of some of its members (e.g. Eucharistic, liturgical, liberation, feminist spiritualities). There is also what one might tem “secular” and New Age usages: many people will claim that they are not religious but they do have spirituality.
We would need to look at some modem writers to clarify for ourselves the concept of spirituality and thus be in a position to see what a Marian spirituality might involve. Sandra Schneiders who is a strong proponent of spirituality as an academic discipline with its own identity2 notes:
Spirituality as a lived experience can be defined as a conscious involvement in the project of life integration through self-transcendence towards the ultimate value one perceives.., when the horizon of ultimate value is the triune God revealed in Jesus Christ and communicated through the Holy Spirit, and the project of self-transcendence, is the living of the paschal mystery within the context of the Christian community, the spirituality is specifically Christian and involves the person with God, others and all reality according to the understanding of these realities that is characteristic of Christian faith.3
Basic to Christian spirituality is the response to God’s prior call. Spirituality is experiential and naturally tends to flower in relationships.
There are some preliminary notions that we can clear up immediately. We need to distinguish Marian devotion and Marian spirituality. More than thirty years ago Wolfgang Beinert
1. See S. De Fiores’ heavily foot-noted Maria nella vita secondo lo Spirito, (Casale Monferrato: Edizioni Piemme, 1998) and the useful bibliography attached to Jestis Castellano Cervera, O.C.D. “La espiritualidad manana: Una perspective actual” in B. Coccia ed. In Communion with Mary: Our Heritage and Prospects for the Future. Sassone Seminar June 2001. (Rome: Edizioni Carmelitane, 2003) pp. 105-108.
2. See Schneiders’ “The Study of Spirituality: Contours and Dynamics of a Discipline,” Studies in Spirituality 8 (1988) pp. 38-57. See also following note.
3. Sandra M. Schneiders, “Christian Spirituality: Definition, Methods, and Types” in P. Sheldrake, ed. The New SCM Dictionary of Christian Spirituality, (London: SCM, 2005) p.1. 2 warned that the crucial issue is to go to the gospel so as to go to Christ and through him to the Father:
Marian devotion has pastoral and existential worth when it reflects this end and is capable of achieving it, we can thus pose the problem of Marian spirituality in this way, which may not please everybody. The formula is this: Marian piety is not identical with devotion to the Virgin; renewal of the later will not automatically renew the former. Marian piety does not in the first place consist of pilgrimages, images, litanies, Marian hymns … the essence of Marian spirituality is truly found not in the fact that a person prays to Mary, but rather that person prays like Mary. Mary is never the goal but only the model of Christian existence; in that she cannot be replaced.
4. Here Beinert privileges piety over devotion, and suggests at best that Marian spirituality belongs to pietas as he describes it, rather than to devotion. The Spiritualities of Mary We need to make a distinction by the spirituality of Mary and Marian spirituality. With Jesús Castellano Cervera we can speak of a descending Mariology which illuminates her predestination and mission; an ascending Mariology as she moves towards the consummation of God’s plan for her.
5. We examine both the spirituality of Mary and Marian spirituality with the modern lenses of scripture, theology, ecclesiology, liturgy, anthropology; we should also take into account of new directions of John Paul II in Redemptoris Mater, directing us toward the evangelical figure of Mary, her presence in the Church, and her maternal mediation.
6. When we look at the spirituality of Mary, we see the great themes of election and grace, freedom and response, she is the woman of faith and servant of the Lord; she embarks on a journey that involves light and darkness; she is the contemplative united to the Sprit and to her Son; she is one of the anawîm in solidarity with all peoples, she is indeed la mujer para los demás (a woman for others) in the felicitous phrase of Father Jesús.
7. These themes can be further developed and enriched by contemporary Trinitarian insights.
The idea of the images of Mary
8. can be developed to show how Mary responded to God. We can see her, firstly as God’s servant following the great lines given by Isaiah (42; 49; 50; 53). Like the Servant of Yahweh she was ‘chosen and called by God’; she remains faithful despite distress. If we are invited to see ourselves conformed to the image of the Servant of Yahweh, we can surely see Mary mirrored in this prophetic figure. Her loyalty has led to the enrichment and salvation of all God’s children. Mary is the servant. Service is not a univocal concept today; it is not appreciated our culture. Some kinds of service are acceptable, but the word “servant” is not. One can see parallels between the Christological slavery/service in Philippians 2 and the Annunciation in which Mary declares herself to be God’s slave. (Luke 4 Beinert refers to Marian piety as Frömmigkeit and distinguishes it from devotion to Mary (Marienverehrung). Maria heute ehren: Eine theologish-pastorale Handreichung (Freiburg: Herder, 1977). pp. 13-15. 5 Jesús Castellano Cervera, “La espiritualidad mariana,” p. 77. 6 Castellano Cervera, “La espiritualidad mariana,” p. 85. 7 Castellano Cervera, “La espiritualidad mariana,” p. 95. 8 Christopher O’Donnell, O.Carm. “Images of Mary for Today,” Spirituality 5, pp. 153-156. 3 1:38 reflects Philippians 2:7). One can also compare the use of the word doulos (slave). In Matthew 20:26-28 and Philippians 2:7-8 with Luke 1:38 – doulé (female slave); service is thus an important feature of her spirituality.
Secondly, we should also point to her service of the Word. Luke presents her as receiving God’s word, pondering and proclaiming it (see Like 1:28-55, 2:1-20) she is the disciple, even thought the title is not scriptural and Mary can been seen as more than a believer in the gospel texts. Vatican Ii notes: “In the course of her Son’s preaching she received the words whereby, in extolling a kingdom beyond the concerns and ties of flesh and blood, she declared blessed those who heard and kept the word of God.” (Mark 3:35 – Luke 11:27-28 – Lumen Gentium 58). There is too the famous statement of St. Augustine: “it counted more for Mary to be the disciple of Christ and to be the mother of Christ.”
Thirdly, she is a woman of faith who believed against odds; we see her faith at Cana and on Calvary (see John 2:5; 19:25-28a), Mary is surely an example of those praised by Jesus: Blessed are those who have not seen yet believe. John 20:29. When we compare the words of Elizabeth and those of the woman in the crowd in Luke we see Mary as a model of faith: Blessed are you among women and blessed is the fruit of your womb… blessed is she who believed, (Luke 1: 42, 45), and Blessed is the womb that bore you and the breasts that nursed you. Jesus said: blessed rather are those who hear the word of God and keep it (Luke 11: 27-2 8).
As Vatican II so beautifully says Mary embarked at the Annunciation on a “pilgrimage of faith” (Lumen Gentium: 58) from the Annunciation to Calvary, Easter and Pentecost. Her faith moreover was mediated (through Joseph, shepherds, Simeon and Anna, Jesus at the age of 12 and later in his public ministry – see Mark 3:31-34) she learns God’s plan for the infant Church through Peter (Acts 1:12-20) she does not understand, but ponders (see Luke 1:29, 2:23; 2:50; with 2:19, 51).
Fourthly, with many contemporary exegetes we can see in Luke 1-12 the spirituality of the anawîm9 the privileged little ones (see Luke 9:48, with 1:48 and Matt 11:25) Finally we can see her as a woman of the Spirit (see Luke 1:35) overshadowed (see Luke 1:28, 30) and awaiting the Spirit at Pentecost (see Acts 1:14, 2:104).
These images point to the way in which Mary was blessed by God and to her response, namely to her spirituality.
Marian Spirituality We have seen Mary’s spirituality: now we look at what a Marian spirituality might be. But firstly we need to look a bit more carefully at the notion. Recently Tina Beattie in a short, compressed dictionary article dealt explicitly with Marian spirituality:
9. See B. Buby Mary the Faithful Disciple (New York—Mahwah: Paulist Press, 1985) p. 71. Buby notes that Luke is the evangelist of the Holy Spirit and of the anawîm. Further, see Vatican II’s Dogmatic Constitution on the Church, Lumen Gentium, 55.4
Marian spirituality can only be understood as authentically Christian when it is an integral part of the life of faith, it invites the believer to deepen his or her relationship to Christ, to become incorporated into the community of the Church, and to seek a harmonious balance between the active and contemplative dimensions of a faith expressed in prayer and social action.
10. She notes the difference between East and West
Marian spirituality developed along different lines in the Eastern and Western Churches. While the Orthodox Church still draws on the early tradition to represent Mary as an iconic maternal figure who communicates awe and compassion, humility and glory, Western spirituality has reflected cultural and historical influences so that devotion to Mary bears the marks of evolving and sometimes contested beliefs and practices.
11. The difference between East and West is even more significant. The East does not evidence the split between theology and spirituality so frequently deplored by Karl Rahner and Hans Urs von Balthasar.
In general one can say that Eastern theology is characterized by a tight union (stretta unione) between spirituality and dogma, so that spirituality is the vision from within the dogma, whilst dogma is the normative expression of spirituality: dogma without spirituality would be ideology and spirituality without dogma would be pietism.
12. The recent ARCIC statement concurs:
In the late Middle Ages scholastic theology grew increasingly apart from spirituality. Less and less rooted in scriptural exegesis, theologians relied on logical probability to establish their positions and Nominalists speculated on what could be done by the absolute power and will of God. Spirituality, no longer in creative tension with theology emphasized affectivity and personal experience, in popular religion, Mary came widely to be viewed as an intermediary between God and humanity, and even a worker of miracles with powers that verged on the divine, this popular piety in due course influenced the theological opinions of those who had grown up with it, and who subsequently elaborated a theological rational for the florid Marian piety of the Late Middle Ages.
13. We can look more closely at Marian spirituality beginning with contemporary liturgy. In the 10 Tina Beattie, “Mary and Spirituality,” New SCM Dictionary of Christian Spirituality, (London: SCM, 2005) p. 424. 11 Tina Beattie, “Mary and Spirituality”, p. 425. 12 E.G. Farrugia, “Spirito Santo e teologia orientale” in Dizionario dell’Oriente Cristiano (Rome: Pont. Inst. Orientale, 2000), p. 722. 13 Mary, Grace and Hope in Christ. The ARCIC Agreed Statement (London—Harrisburg: Morehouse, 2005) n.43, pp. 40-41.
5
1986 collection of votive Masses in honor of our Lady there is available General Introduction with draws on Marialis Cultus and liturgical texts to speak of the union of the worshipper with Mary.
14. One of the Masses “Mary, Mother and Teacher in the Spirit,” is based on the Carmelite feast of Our Lady of Mount Carmel.
15. Here there are two main ideas: Mary is model for Christian holiness and she is Mother who draws us on that way.
Many Spiritualities We have mentioned earlier the multiplicity of spiritualities. Where then does Marian spirituality fit in? But first we need a word about how spiritualities differ. All Christian spiritualities will have common elements: sacraments, especially Baptism and Eucharist; the word of God, prayer, faith, hope, and love, both of God and neighbor. The difference lies not in that one spirituality will have faith and another substitutes hope. The one mystery of Christ, which is a sharing in the life of the Trinity through grace in faith, hope, and charity, is found in a variety of spiritualities, all of them based on the one New Testament revelation. All genuine spiritualities must have the whole of Christian doctrine in an ordered and holy life. But the emphasis will differ, Carmelite spirituality emphasizes prayer, Mary, and the word of God, more perhaps than other spiritualities. Franciscan spirituality has a major focus on poverty and on the humble humanity of Jesus.
To understand how spiritualities are all the same and all different, the best analogy may be from life. We will recognize as being “American” three citizens of the United States who are of different ethnicity. Each will have the same limbs, the same bodily functions, and so forth, but they can be identified both as Americans and as members of their different ethnic groups. The elements are all the same, but the order, the balance, the emphasis will be subtly different. Another example might be yard full of building materials: hundreds of cubic feet of similar blocks, hundreds of square feet of timber, and hundreds of feet of wire, pipes, etc., three builders could take the same materials, even perhaps the same amount of materials, and build very different single story bungalows, each having living space, kitchen plumbing, and two bedrooms, one might have two bedrooms the same size, another might have one large bedroom and a smaller one; the same for the living space related to the kitchen. We would not identify the different houses seeking what extra materials were used in one rather than another. The structure and order would be different.16
But such considerations about the various spiritualities do not fully apply when we look at Marian and other spiritualities. There is a significant, but often overlooked essay written in 1960 by Hans Urs von Balthasar where he argued that Marian spirituality underlies all others. A spirituality centered on the attitude exemplified by Mary, is… not just one spirituality
Collection of Masses on the Blessed Virgin Mary, 2 vols: Sacramentary and Lectionary, (Collegeville: Liturgical Press, 1992). Vol. 1, “General Introduction,” n. 13. 15 Collection of Masses on the Blessed Virgin Mary, 2 vols: Sacramentary and Lectionary, (Collegeville: Liturgical Press, 1992), n. 32. Vol. 1: Mass text 249-25 1, preface n.32, p. 148; Vol. 2: Readings, Pry. 8:17-21, 34-35 or Isa 56:1, 6-7 with Psalm 15 and gospel Matt 12:46-50 or John 19:25-27, or general appendix III, 19— Mark 3:31-35. 16 See Christopher O’Donnell, O.Carm., “Core Marian Themes in the Carmelite Order” in Carmel and Mary: Theology and History of a Devotion (Washington: Carmelite Institute, 2002), p. 82.6 among others. For this reason, although Mary is an individual believer and, as such, the prototype and model of all response in faith, she resolves all particular spiritualities into the one spirituality of the bride of Christ, the Church.
What we learn from Mary, a lesson valid for all times, is that the response of the Handmaid of the Lord to the Word working in her all his will in such a special an unique manner—is not just one particular theme in theology. What is special in Mary’s spirituality is the radical renunciation of any special spirituality other than the overshadowing of the Most High and the indwelling of the divine Word… The idea of making Marian spirituality one among other is, therefore, a distortion.17
The paradigm of all response to God is thus a Marian one. Balthasar is asserting that any authentic spirituality will therefore be Marian, even if this is not explicated. To be Marian or not is scarcely an option for a genuinely Christian spirituality. If we look at what would commonly be called particular spiritualities, we see that though each has a focus, the whole of any spirituality is really an articulation of Mary’s total “yes,” patterned on her expression of life of the Trinitarian and the practical implications of this foundational response to God’s Word. These are indications in contemporary thought which suggest that authentic spirituality must be Marian. To grasp fully Balthazar’s meaning here we should remember that in the 1960’s he saw the Church as having a Marian and a Petrine dimension. Later he moved to seeing the Church constituted by four founding figures: Peter (institutional), Paul (missionary), John (contemplative/mystical) and James (law and tradition). Mary was not on the same level, but above these, giving each of them their meaning and vitality.
Marian spirituality will always reflect a particular time and culture. Thus in the later Middle Ages, Mary was no longer seen as the majestic maternal presence of the early medieval Church, but as a tender and compassionate mother. In the years following the Black Death, images such as the mater dolorosa and the pietà suggest an association between the suffering of the people and the suffering of the mother of the crucified Christ.
18. Marian spirituality means adopting a set of values, attitudes, and activities that help us to respond to God’s plan for us and to insert us into the relationship with Mary that Christ wants for us.
19. The concretization of the elements of such spirituality will again reflect times and cultures. It will demand contemplation of her, as well as communion and identification. It will involve taking up the characteristic of her life. In the language of Fr. Jesús, it should give rise to an epiphany of Mary in the life of the Church, so that we too bring forth Jesus in the Church.
20. Marian Mysticism We begin with Spain and its golden age of Mary and of mysticism. There are many excellent studies on Mary in the works of St. Teresa of Avila and St. John of the Cross. In Mariology as 17 Hans Urs von Balthasar, “Spirituality” in Word and Redemption, Essays in Theology 2 (New York: Herder & Herder, 1965), pp. 97-98. 18 Tina Beattie, “Mary and Spirituality” New SCM Dictionary of Christian Spirituality, p. 425. 19 Tina Beattie, “Mary and Spirituality”, p. 425. 20 A theme developed by Bi. Titus Brandsma, O.Carm., (d. 1942) in various places, e.g. Carmelite Mysticism: Historical Sketches, Fiftieth Anniversary Edition (Darien IL: Carmelite Press, 1986), pp. 33-34, 59. 7
In may other respects, St. Teresa of Avila entered into an existing heritage which she mad her own and developed. After her mother’s death she dedicated herself to Mary (Life 1:7). She constantly refers to her own wearing of Our Lady’s habit. She had mystical experiences in which Mary appeared to her (Life 33:14). She advised imitation of Mary, a theme already abundantly developed in the medieval period. Her notion of prayer as friendship and intimate relationship (Life 8:6) is reflected in her Marian devotion. An important feature of her piety is her very strong and close bond with St. Joseph. She also adopted an older practice of seeing Mary as the true prioress of the community (Relaz. spirit. 25) St. John of the Cross, however does not mention Mary very often in his extant writings, but the references are highly significant: Mary is the supreme contemplative (Ascent 3:2, 10); the Incarnation is pondered through the mind of the eternal Trinity and through the eyes of Mary (Romance on the Incarnation).
There were also many other Carmelites writing on Mary in the period 1550-1650. There were some more original writers as in the Zaragoza Monastery of the Incarnation (after 1588). There we should note in particular Maria Escobar (d. 1634) who proclaimed herself a slave of Mary and received many mystical graces in and through Mary. It is well known that Cardinal Bérulle (d. 1629) who brought the discalced nuns to France from Spain in 1604, failed in his attempt to impose the devotion of slavery to Mary on them. This theme in post-Reformation Carmelite Mariology deserves further study; it certainly antedates the “True Devotion” of St. Louis Grignon de Montfort (d. 1716).
In the Low Countries we have the important Marian mystic, Maria de S. Teresa Petijt (d. 1677) and her director the Venerable Michael of St. Augustine (d. 1684) whose mysticism has been described as “contemplative life of God in Mary and of Mary in God.” But there is no confusion of the divine and the human: there is indeed union with Mary, but this has its fruition simultaneously in God. The earlier stages of this life, called “Mariform” by Michael, consists in being always alert to Mary and to God, so that one does only what is pleasing to them. This might be said to belong more to the ascetic life, since one can choose to have Mary in view and, with the aid of grace, cultivate a relationship with her, the union with God through Mary, however, is mystical given by God as a special gift.
In Italy we have extensive Marian writing, the Neapolitan Carmelite foundress, the Venerable Seraphina of God, Prudentia Pisa (d. 1699), is yet another with experiences of Marian Mysticism. The writings of St. Mary Magdalene de Pazzi (d. 1607) speak frequently about the beauty of Mary and of her purity, but they are more reminiscent of visions of the Mother of God common to other mystics like St Teresa than of mystical union with Mary.
The Carmelite Marian mystics have their experiences not only as special and personal gifts from God, but also in order that they might teach the Church. The Mariform mysticism of Mary Petijt is not something eccentric in the history of spirituality; it teaches the whole Church something important about the journey to God. What may not be explicit in other mystics is very clear in Michael of St. Augustine and in Mary Petijt, namely that divine union comes about through a person becoming more closely clothed with the virtues of Mary, and through her continuing presence and accompaniment. Theirs is the most dramatic and the most sublime expression of the truth continually expressed in all Carmelite Marian writings, 8 namely the motherly presence of Mary accompanies the Carmelite always and growth in holiness is found through opening oneself to her presence and motherly care, the fact that a reading from Michael of St, Augustine I proposed for the Solemn Commemoration of Our Lady of Mount Camel is surely an indication to the Order to reflect on the journey to Jesus through Mary.
Conclusion
In cultivating a Marian spirituality we look to the vision of Vatican II:
In celebrating the annual cycle of the mysteries of Christ, Holy Church honors the Blessed Virgin Mary, Mother of God, with a special love. She is inseparably linked with her Son’s saving work. In her the Church admires and exalts the most excellent fruit of redemption and joyfully contemplates, as in a faultless image that which she herself desires and hopes wholly to be (Sacrosanctum Concilium, 103).
Our Carmelite way has been marked by looking on the Virgin Mary and Mother of God as Mother, Patroness, Most Pure Virgin, and Sister. These are not only aspects of her life that we imitate, they are the ways she comes to us, and we come to her in a relationship of love; in the end, spirituality is about relationships with God who comes to us as Trinity and who has given us Mary as a way. We come to God not just by imitation being like Mary, but with her who is, as the tradition of the Eastern icons constantly shows, the hodigitria, the one who points the way, this same tradition points to a parallel between the East and the Carmelite tradition: Mary’s protecting veil, Pokrov, finds its western counterpart in the Scapular which in its fullest sense sums up the Marian spirituality of the Carmelite Order.
MARY ICON OF THE CHURCH
A very easy question to ask, but a difficult one to answer is, what is the Church? Even more difficult is, what is the Church for? Try answering the first one, by completing the sentence, “The Church is…” What did you come up with?
It is relatively effortless to come up with a name for the Church, such as the People of God/the Body of Christ. It is much more difficult to come up with a statement that locks into the heart of the Church. That is bad enough, but today many people would say, why bother?
The Church has in some ways a bad name: there are divisions and scandals; people are drifting away because what the Church offers no longer seems important to them; some people find the Church too authoritarian for the values of our society, whilst others feel that it has given up on its birthright; others will find the Church deficient in upholding or promoting what they consider to be critical rights and values.
I would like to approach the Church today from the perspective of Mary. I speak of Mary as the icon of the Church.
An icon is a sacred image that draws us into the mystery of God and his love. To speak of Mary as an icon is to come to reflect in calm and peace. An icon is not penetrated with the casual glance we give to a newspaper heading, or a seaside photo. To appreciate an icon takes time; we must ponder before the icon so that it can speak to us.
My contention is that to reflect before Mary in prayerful contemplation is to be drawn into what is most central about the Church. Mary is a figure of beauty and repose; she is a symbol that is calm and serene; she is a woman at once tender and strong.
We cannot contemplate Mary aright if we come with a loveless ideology, with anger and recrimination against other members of the Church.
Today we come to Mary so that she can teach us the most profound truths about the Church. But what is the Church we come to learn about from Mary?
Remember the sentence: “The Church is…” When we hear the word “Church,” do we think of our parish, about the pope, about the sacraments, about catechists, about teaching or handing on the faith? Unfortunately today not many people think of the Holy Trinity when they hear the word “Church.” Yet it is in the Trinity that the Church has its deepest roots.
In fact if we want to think rightly about the Church, we should start with the Trinity. To grasp the heart of the Church we need to begin with Trinitarian love.
I would put it to you that the most important things about the Church can be summed up in four short phrases: The Church is quite simply: “Trinitarian love poured out on the world; manifested in the Paschal Mystery; celebrated in the Eucharist; shared with the world.”
Four short phrases, but very dense ones. What I propose to do is to reflect on these four little phrases, but to do so looking on the figure of Mary. Above all she is the one who knows the love of the Trinity that has been poured out over the world; she experienced in the depths of her being the Paschal Mystery of her Son; she can teach us about the Eucharist; she is the model of the Church sent forth in service and evangelization.
It is Mary then that can help us to ponder and to tease out the meaning of the definition I have given of the Church: Trinitarian love poured out; manifested in the Paschal Mystery; celebrated in the Eucharist; shared with the world.
It will be obvious that this vision of the Church is far removed from what interests the media about the Church. It is also far above the things that preoccupy people about the Church like papal teaching, the level of consultation in the parish, the personality of the bishop, parish priest or Eucharistic minister.
Though faith is of course one, and we cannot neglect any revealed truth without imperilling the whole, nevertheless we have become engulfed in secondary truths of the faith, rather than what is primary.
There is surely something wrong when people get worked up by questions of authority and never marvel at the wonder of the Trinity; there is something quite odd surely about the number of right-wing groups in this century which have invoked the patronage of the Virgin Mary.
I think, for example, of the Slaves of the Immaculate Heart of Mary, a group in Boston in the 1940s who believed that everyone who was not a Roman Catholic was destined for hell. Its leader was excommunicated by Pius XII.
Again, we have allowed ourselves to a rather serious extent to have become bogged down, if not in trifles, at least in what is peripheral. Our vision of the Church is too often pragmatic, dreary and angry. We need to lift up our eyes to the beauty which is at the heart of the Church. And Mary, who is supremely the beautiful one, is a sure guide.
Trinitarian Love Poured Out
One of the loveliest passages of the New Testament, a text used by the Church in the Liturgy of the Hours in Monday Evening Prayer, is the opening of the letter to the Ephesians (1:3-14). The present pope used the same passage to open his major encyclical letter on Mary, Redemptoris Mater (1987).
It is a majestic sweep from eternity to eternity, the whole divine plan of the Father, manifested in the Son and brought to fruition by the Spirit. It is called quite simply “the mystery” (Ephesians 1:9; 3:9).
This great plan is brought into our world by creation, but especially by re-creation in the Son through the Spirit. This plan begins to unfold in the apparently simple story of the annunciation as told by Luke (1:26-38); rather more than unfold, it is all there in kernel.
We approach this text with Mary; indeed it is a daily prayer in the Church which we pray in the Angelus which recalls the central truths of this event. We ponder the Annunciation with Mary; she leads us into Trinitarian love.
There was an apparition in Rome in 1947 which is little-known outside Italy. It occurred at Tre Fontane, the place of the martyrdom of St. Paul, where three fountains were said to have sprung up at the three places where his head hopped at his martyrdom.
Bruno Carnacchiola was a militant seventh-day Adventist. He was plotting to assassinate Pius XII and was preparing an article against the Mother of God. The Virgin appeared to him and on the first occasion said one word, “basta!” (enough!). She subsequently gave her name as “Sono colei chi habita nella Trinit” (I am the one who dwells in the Trinity).
We can find a not dissimilar idea in Irish devotion about Mary. Irish culture in some ways is much more matriarchal than British society. When in Irish Mary is called Bean t na Tronide (The Housewife of the Trinity), it is implied that she is a servant of the Trinity in caring for all on behalf of the Trinity; she, as it were, sets the tone in heaven and earth.
The Church, moreover, must continually and ever more deeply be patterned on Mary.
We look for a moment at the Annunciation story to see what it might tell us about the Church, about Trinitarian love poured out. To begin with we should notice the small scale of the event: the angel comes to Nazareth which was a village of a few hundred people.
Quite simply God does not think in our way; we would surely have the angel come to a major metropolis like Rome, Corinth or to one of the centres of civilization like Athens. Already we are learning something about God’s ways and about what the Church must be. It is not great in the eyes of the world, but small, weak, almost insignificant, but of immense importance from God’s perspective.
The angel brings a word from the Father: Gabriel greets Mary with two mysterious words, chaire kecharitman instead of the normal Hebrew salutation, “peace Mary.” The angel’s address gives as it were a new name for Mary, “Rejoice O Graced One” (Luke 1:28).
These are God’s continual words also to the Church: despite it weakness and constant failures, the Church is the graced one, and is called upon to rejoice.
That call is particularly apposite today I spoke recently with a theology professor at one of the leading Roman universities there who remarked about the sheer heaviness and gloom that one senses about the Vatican despite the fact that the Pope himself frequently speaks about hope and the renewal for the coming millennium.
But rejoicing cannot be turned on at command. We only exult if we have a reason. If we are td rejoice, if we are to be light-hearted and at peace, we need to look to the deepest ground of the Church.
Like Mary, the Church is graced and it is covered with God’s love. All is well, we can indeed celebrate. But there are difficulties.
Mary sensed problems too. Luke indeed is careful to tell us that Mary was deeply disturbed at greeting at the angel’s greeting (Luke 1:29). In fact Mary not knowing or being disturbed is a theme in the first two chapters of Luke’s gospel (see 1:29.34; 2:19.33.48.49.50).
Mary receives reassurance from the angel, “You have found favour with God.” If instead of looking at the problems of the Church, we too were to listen to the word of God, we also would be reassured by the hope and promise of the great mystery which is the divine plan.
The angel goes on to proclaim the future destiny of the child: He will be great, and will be called Son of the Most High, and the Lord God will give to him the throne of his ancestor David. He will reign over the house of Jacob forever, and of his kingdom there will be no end (Luke 1:32-33).
She is told therefore that the glorious, royal messianic prophecies are now to be fulfilled. Her Son will be Lord of all.
We will see later how he will be king and how these triumphant prophecies will be fulfilled through the words on the Cross, “Jesus of Nazareth, King of the Jews” (Luke 23:3.37-3 8).
Again we see reasons for raising our eyes in hope and rejoicing. Instead of the pessimism and depression afflicting the Church, we are to contemplate its Lord, Jesus.
We become pessimistic when we look at ourselves; we can be optimistic and confident when we look at the Lord. So too with the Church. With Mary we are being invited to look to the lordship of Jesus as the ground of our hope.
Jesus is Lord; evil will not have the last word; the gates of hell will not triumph over the Church, weak as it may appear to be at times.
But Mary is still confused, “How can this be?” (Luke 1:34). We can easily grasp her perplexity. She is engaged to Joseph and there is a wedding in the offing. She asks equivalently therefore, “What am I to do? Mary – Joseph? Break off the engagement?…”
She is given the only answer that will ultimately satisfy: The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you (Luke 1:35).
Mary is to be enveloped by the Holy Spirit: it is God who ensures that God’s plans are fulfilled.
We are invited to look in the same direction. The tasks facing the Church are indeed immense, and when we look around us, we are struck by weakness.
We will not solve problems by condemnation or harsh invective. It is the gentle Spirit, the One whom St. Catherine of Siena loved to call “Clemency” or Mercy, that will support us.
Even though Mary was all-holy and perfect in the virtues of faith and hope, God still looked on her weakness as a human and gave her a sign to sustain her faith and hope: her elderly cousin Elizabeth is now pregnant.
It is not just any sign, but a miracle; a wonder moreover to make Mary rejoice in the good fortune of her cousin.
The Church is given great promises and reassurances. But we are not left without signs and wonders to strengthen our weak faith, and to console us in difficulties.
I wonder what is the great sign that God gives us today? It is not in great rallies, or impressive buildings, nor indeed primarily in remarkable Church leaders.
The great sign, the only convincing sign is love. When we look at the Church with unjaundiced eye, we see so much love, the sheer goodness of people, their generosity in family and social life. We see too so much heroic love of God in ordinary people.
As long as such love is being produced by the Holy Spirit, we need never be pessimistic about the Church.
And in case there is any doubt, we are given the word of the angel to Mary, “Nothing is impossible with God.”
This statement is found several times in the Bible when there is some situation of human impossibility (e.g. Genesis 18:14; Jeremiah 32:27; Job 42:2; Matthew 19:26). Again we are being told to look towards God and not to be focused on the problems that surround us.
Alter this Trinitarian revelation of God’s promises and invitation, Mary pronounces herself doul, a slave or servant, “Here am I, the servant, or rather slave, of the Lord; let it be with me according to your word” (Luke 1:38).
Here is her complete act of faith in the word, the command, the promise of God.
The Church is nothing if it is not a Church of faith. Faith here is not a narrow presentation of dogmas or truths, but a total commitment which of course involves belief, but also demands hope and commitment.
If it is to be modelled on Mary, the Church must constantly say a complete “yes” to what God says, commends and promises.
Once again, a Trinitarian vision of the Church lifts up our minds to God and the wonders of his plan. Already in the first phrase of our definition of the Church, “Trinitarian love poured out,” we have an answer to much of the pessimism and despondency which surrounds the Church today.
MARY ICON OF HOPE
Every age has its own conceits about itself. Throughout the pages of history people have been asserting that things are getting worse, that standards are falling, that morals are crumbling. Yet though each culture and each age speaks in this way, there are also voices that propose an opposite view, that we are better, wiser, more capable than those who have gone before us. Both are of course true. But at a particular time, one or other vision will tend to dominate.
In the Church today we tend to hear the more pessimistic voices, to be aware of darker hues. The great theologian of Vatican II, Karl Rahner began from about 1980 to speak publicly of a wintertime that had fallen on the Church of Rome (winterliche Zeit). The enthusiasm and vitality that had been obvious after Vatican II had faced hard realism. Hans Urs von Balthasar returned several times to the theme of anti-Romanism before he died in 1988. Last year I met a Roman theologian who spoke about the heaviness emerging from the Vatican, despite the Pope’s emphasis on joy and hope for the millennium.
It is easy to see why people are more pessimistic. There are many scandals in the Church; there is a serious fall-off in liturgical practice; there is frustration and anger among many laity; the bright promises of the Council seem to have given way to apathy or disappointment; religious and priestly vocations have decreased dramatically.
In his important apostolic letter for the millennium, Tertio millennio adveniente (1994), the Pope suggested various areas of the Church’s life that we should examine in the first phase of preparations for the millennium. One could suggest that each of them could give grounds for pessimism: ecumenism, intolerance and violence, religious indifference, secularism and the breakdown of ethics, social justice, liturgical and scriptural life, communion and participation in the Church through charism and ministries, dialogue with the world and with the great world religions. None of these could be described as an area of bright prospects or even perhaps outstanding achievements (Apostolic Letter nn. 34-36). But the Pope still calls on us to be a Church of hope (n. 46).
Is this pessimism confined only to the Church, or do we experience it at personal levels also? Do we feel that we are we improving with age like good cider, fine wine or a VSOP brandy, becoming more mellow and growing psychologically and spiritually, abounding in fruitfulness and good works? Or do we feel that we are like an old boat in a run-down harbour or a derelict canal, getting rusty and growing barnacles?
The present Pope has sensed a need for hope, and he has had a deep conviction that the coming millennium is to be a chance, an opportunity for the Church and the world to bring about a profound renewal and vitality. It is in this context that I want this morning to speak of hope.
We rarely hear much about hope: we have teachings of love – receiving love and showing love; we often stress faith. But hope is often a forgotten virtue, a sleeper that needs awakening in our Christian consciousness.
In considering hope I wish to present it with reasonable comprehensiveness. I will take the person of Mary to ground what I wish to say in the word of God.
Exploring Hope
The word “hope” is often loosely used; we say “I hope” quite casually. But to plumb the meaning of Christian hope we need to speak with some accuracy.
Firstly, hope is always about the future, and about something that I do not have. I can’t say this morning that I hope for a good day yesterday. But I can say today that I hope for a good day tomorrow.
Secondly, hope is always about something I do not have. I would not say now, “I hope to be in Walsingham on Tuesday.” I am here. When you have something you enjoy it, act on it, you do not hope.
Thirdly, hope is about something that is reasonably possible. I would not say, “When I have given my workshop this evening at 5 p.m., I hope that somebody will slip me an envelope containing $50,000;” nor would I say that I hope that the Pope will drop in for the Mass tomorrow. Now both are possible. There are people or firms in this corner of England that could get together $50,000. The Pope could order a jet and be here by tomorrow. But I do not hope for either. There are absolutely no grounds for hoping for a huge gift of money; there are no grounds either for hoping that the Pope will drop by. So though both are possible, neither is at all likely, and therefore I do not hope for either. However, if I buy a lottery ticket, I may have some hope, even if weak – I am in with an equal chance along with 18,000,000 other lottery punters.
Fourthly, I do not go around telling myself to have hope about trifles; hope is about something that is difficult. I do not seriously hope that there will be coffee for breakfast tomorrow; it is almost certain that coffee will be available, and if it is not, then my world will not collapse. The word “hope” is used accurately only when there is some problem in the way of my desires: I cannot control the weather, so I can hope for a fine day; I may have an illness, and so I hope for a cure; examinations are hazardous, so I hope to pass.
At this stage it is clear that hope is about what we do not have, something that lies to the future, that is difficult, but possible.
Hope in the Bible
We find these ideas confirmed in the Bible. The word hope is not used often in the Old Testament, only about thirty times. The New Testament usages of the word elpis is about double that. But when we read the Bible, we see that the idea, or the reality of hope really dominates the sacred writings. In fact one might say that the Old Testament holds out hope, and the New Testament is about the realization of hope.
The words used to indicate Old Testament hope are very significant. Here are some of them: “trust,” “seek refuge in,” “expect,” “wait for.” Thus the good king, Hezekiah was said to trust in the Lord: the city was besieged by Sennacherib, but the king trusted in God and the angel of the Lord in one night struck down 185,000 soldiers of the Assyrian army. Later when he became seriously ill, Hezekiah again turned to the Lord and was healed (2 Kings 18-20). Again we read the advice of Isaiah: “Thus said the Lord God, the Holy One of Israel: In returning and rest you shall be saved; in quietness and in trust shall be your strength (Is 30:15). In the Psalms we find: “My mighty rock, my refuge is in God. Trust in him at all times, O people; pour out your hearts before him; God is a refuge for us” (Ps 62:7-8). Again the Psalmist says, “I waited, I waited on the Lord and he heard my cry” (Ps 40:1). Again, we have the prophet Micah, “As for me, I will look to the Lord, I will wait for the God of my salvation, my God will hear me.”
In the Old Testament a spirituality of the poor, the anawim gradually develops. The great theme of the poor of the Lord does not principally focus on material poverty, though it is present. It is rather a group of people who were educated by the prophets and who learned both by the prophetic word and by the harsh experience of their people that one cannot trust in foreign treaties or allegiances, in riches or armies, but only in God. We find their intuition in Psalms 9-10 or in prophetic passages like Is 49:13: “Sing for joy, O heavens and exult, O earth; break forth, O mountains into singing! For the Lord has comforted his people, and will have compassion on his suffering ones.
Mary Icon of Hope
Mary was born into a culture of hope, into the groups of the poor of the Lord, such as her cousins, Elizabeth and Zechariah and the elderly prophets Simeon and Anna in the Temple (see Luke 2:32,38). Zechariah’s canticle the Benedictus breathes the spirituality of the anawim (Luke 1:68-79); Simeon is described as a man who “was religious and devout, looking forward to the consolation of Israel’ (Luke 2:25); Anna spoke to all the poor in the Temple, to “all those who were looking for the redemption Israel” (Luke 2:38). These are all prime examples of he true Israelites who hope in the Lord.
I want to speak of Mary as an icon of hope. An icon is a sacred image, which is a medium that allows us to be in contact with a holy person. The holy person gazes on us through the icon; we reach up towards the holy person through the icon.
Mary is a source of hope. The Church prays in the late 11th century prayer, “Hail holy Queen. Hail our life, our sweetness and our hope.” We look to Mary’s life and mission to grasp the meaning of hope; we look to her in glory as our Mother, our Sister, our Friend, our Guide to be led deeply into the experience of hope.
Four Questions about Hope
We need to ask four questions about hope for ourselves and for the Church, and we shall reflect on Mary as we answer them. We are now dealing with theological hope, the hope that is first rooted in us at baptism, along with faith and charity. The questions can be summed up in four words: who? what? why? how? That is: who hopes? what is hope? why do we hope? how do we hope?
Firstly then, “who hopes?” Hope is a virtue that belongs to all who have not yet achieved what they need. Hope belongs to all on earth, and in a sense to those in purgatory.
We begin our reflection on Mary’s hope with the Annunciation (Luke 1:26-38); all reflection on Mary begins there, and must constantly return there. God has been promising his deliverance to his people. The waiting has been long, as humanity had to learn slowly that salvation comes only from God. The Chosen People was taught by failure to hope only in God. It was only when the anawim were formed that humanity could be approached by God.
There are two classical meditations on the Annunciation in the doctors of the Church. One is by St. Bernard who pictures all of humanity waiting for Mary to say yes to the angel; St. Bernard encourages Mary to say the great yes for us: “You have heard that you shall conceive, not of man, but of the Holy Spirit. The angel is waiting for your answer; it is time for him to return to God who sent him. We too are waiting, O Lady, for the word of pity.. If you consent, straightaway shall we all be freed.. .Why delay? Why tremble? Believe, speak, receive! Let your humility put on boldness, and your modesty be clothed with trust.. .Open your lips to speak; Behold the Desired of alt nations is outside, knocking at your door” (Liturgy of Hours, Office of Readings, December 20).