Lectio divina
Believing is a necessity
"Blessed is she who believed".
(Lk 1:45)
The Treatise on True Devotion to Mary by Saint Louis Marie de Montfort with its approximately 300 editions in 30 languages, must be counted among the most universally known and loved books of contemporary Catholicism; it has shaped generations of Christians in faith and love for Christ, it has forged apostles of the kingdom of Christ, including Karol Woityla, the Polish worker of the Solvay factory famous for having stained that little book with soda by rereading and leafing through it.
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Blessed is she who believed
The illustrious French author, summarizing the content of the work in the final part, recalls that the expression of the truest devotion to the Mother of God consists in "performing one's actions 'with Mary'. That is, one must raise one's eyes to Mary as the model of every virtue and perfection, expressly shaped by the Holy Spirit so that our weak forces could imitate it. In every action, therefore, one must ask oneself what Mary's attitude was or would be in our own circumstances. To this end, one must study and meditate on the great virtues she exercised during her earthly life.
Among all these virtues, the "living faith" stands out in a particular way, by which she believed without hesitation in the word of the Angel and believed faithfully and constantly until the foot of the cross on Calvary".
Mary of Nazareth is great in the eyes of God and of the Christian generations first and above all else for her faith.
(cf. Lk 1:48).
Her cousin Elizabeth responds to Mary's greeting when she comes to visit her after the angel's announcement, recognizing and proclaiming, by the impulse of the Holy Spirit, the truth about that humble virgin: "Blessed is she who believed that there would be a fulfillment of what was spoken to her from the Lord" (Lk 1:45). Mary entered into the mystery of Christ because she believed, she totally abandoned herself to the will of God, she trusted Him hopelessly: "Behold, I am the handmaid of the Lord; let it be to me according to your word."
(Lk 1:38).
«They are probably the most beautiful words in Scripture. It is certainly reckless to pretend to capture and bring to light the profound charge contained in them.
"I am the servant". The servant has no rights. The rights of the servant are placed in the hands of her Lord. The servant is not to take initiatives, but to accept the decisions of the Lord. I am a "poor woman of God". I am the poorest creature on earth, and therefore the freest creature in the world. I have no will of my own. The will of my Lord is my will and the will of all of you is my will; I am the servant of all: in what way can I serve you? I am the Lady of the world, because I am the servant of the world.
"Let it be done to me": even grammatically, Mary uses the passive form. With this declaration the Mother offers herself in free and available possession. And in this way he demonstrates tremendous trust, a bold and reckless abandonment into the hands of the Father, accepting all risks, submitting to all events and circumstances that the future may bring.
In the fiat! is contained much... a universal consecration beats within, a self-giving without reserve and without limits, an acceptance with arms raised high any event, even unexpected, desired or permitted by the Father».
Generous response.
Bold abandonment.
Obedience of faith.
Here are the essential qualities of the "blessed among women" (Lk 1:42), of the "servant of the Lord" (Lk 1:38) entirely subject to the divine will, "happier to receive the faith of Christ than to conceive the flesh of Christ" (St. Augustine).
"To God who reveals is due the "obedience of faith" (Rom 16:26; cf. Rom 1:5; 2 Cor 10:5-6), by which man freely entrusts himself entirely to God", as the Council teaches. This description of faith found perfect implementation in Mary. The "decisive" moment was the Annunciation, and Elizabeth's very words: "And blessed is she who believed" refer first and foremost to this very moment.
In the Annunciation, in fact, Mary abandoned herself completely to God, manifesting the "obedience of faith" to the one who spoke to her through his messenger and offering "the full submission of her intellect and will". She responded, therefore, with all her human, feminine "I", and this response of faith contained a perfect cooperation with "the grace of God which precedes and assists" and a perfect availability to the action of the Holy Spirit, who "continually perfects faith through his gifts".
This fiat of Mary - "let it be done to me" - has decided on the human side the fulfillment of the divine mystery. There is a full consonance with the words of the Son, who according to the Letter to the Hebrews, entering the world, says to the Father: "Sacrifices and offerings you have not desired, but a body you have prepared for me... Behold, I come... to do your will, O God" (Heb 10:5-7).
(John Paul II, encyclical Redemptoris Mater).
In Mary, faith did not remain a notion, a superficial knowledge, a superficial adherence; instead, it became active obedience, extreme concreteness. The virgin of Nazareth played herself completely for God, she entrusted herself hopelessly to the divine Word, she transformed herself into a living offering to the will of the Father. God asked her for everything, literally everything: mind, heart, strength, intelligence, will, life; and the slave of the Lord in the obedience of faith, in the willingness to abandon herself, gave herself fully to the plan of the Most High, she gave absolutely everything and without the possibility of return.
Fortunate Mary, the woman of the unconditional yes to God!
But also "blessed are we, because she believed!" (K. Rahner) Life, light, grace came to us through her trusting adherence to the will of the Father of all good.
Happy are we if with Mary we let ourselves be involved in the vortex of the obedience of faith!. If we do not place limits on divine communications and do not subtract anything from the demands of a pure, generous, holy love.
Man is created by God for self-love to enter into an intimate relationship with Him. The relationship with God is not something that is added from the outside to being-man, it is instead the constitutive property of his nature.
Now, if the essential characteristic of man lies in his relationship with God on the level of being, in order to fully realize himself he must live and develop this relationship also on the level of existence.
The more the reference to God, constitutive of being a man, deepens, is lived and enriched, the more man fully rediscovers himself, is fulfilled and is happy. By pronouncing like Mary her total yes to God's plan for him and conforming his will to that of God, man is fully fulfilled as a man: he brings himself to fulfillment as a creature willed by God, breaks the limits that close him in space and time, transcends all the bars of creatureliness, places himself in the dimension of the divine, of the eternal. Can one dream of greater fulfillment?
«Mary's availability is immediate and unconditional, because the only reasonable attitude of man before God is total adherence.
Mary's greatness is above all in this yes. In the encounter with the angel she spoke very little: a brief question and a total assent. Her future was not at all clear to her; she knew the essential and had asked for nothing more, even though the miraculous conception of the Baptist had been revealed to her, confirming that the God who can do everything would act wonderfully in her.
Mary had understood that the Lord wanted her to be a mother and she also understood the way: by remaining a virgin. She knew that from that moment on, she was guarding God's treasure within her: this child would grow up while she was only the Lord's slave, chosen (why her?) for the fulfillment of the promises. Everything else was obscure to her. But the expression: "Nothing is impossible for God", resounded like an invitation to believe in the incredible, with total trust, even if dark. Faith is proceeding by trusting in the word of God, even without knowing and understanding completely, without expecting reason to overwhelm the mystery.
Believing means being aware that adhering to God, even in the darkness of trial, is the source of life and fulfillment for the human creature.
The "yes" that opened the way to the incarnation of the Word and poured out upon humanity the torrent of graces and blessings from heaven (cf. Jn 1:16-17) is a "yes" pregnant with vitality, a total surrender to the will of God; it is the expression of an absolute availability, to which Mary will always be faithful even as she advances in the darkness, ...up to the foot of the cross.
In this light, the faith of Our Lady can be compared to that of Abraham, called by the apostle Paul "our father in faith".
(cf. Rom 4:12).
In the economy of divine revelation, Abraham's faith marks the beginning of the Old Covenant; Mary's faith in the Annunciation constitutes the beginning of the New Covenant.
And, just as Abraham "had faith in hope against all hope" that he would become the father of many peoples (cf. Rom 4:18), so too, Mary at the moment of the Annunciation, after having indicated her condition as a virgin, believed that through the power of the Most High she would become the Mother of the Son of God, inaugurating the new times.
(cf. Lk 1:34-35).
"The Annunciation represents the culminating moment of Mary's faith in awaiting Christ, but it is also the starting point, from which her entire "journey towards God" begins, her entire journey of faith.
And on this path, in an eminent and truly heroic way, indeed, with an ever greater heroism of faith, the obedience she professed to the word of divine revelation will be implemented. And this "obedience of faith" on Mary's part throughout her journey will have surprising analogies with Abraham's faith.
To believe means to "abandon oneself" to the very truth of the word of the living God, knowing and humbly recognizing "how inscrutable are his judgments and how inscrutable his ways"
(Rom 11:33).
Mary, who by the eternal will of the Most High found herself, one might say, at the very center of those "inaccessible ways" and "inscrutable judgments" of God, conforms to them in the shadow of faith, accepting fully and with an open heart all that is disposed in the divine plan".
(John Paul II, Redemptoris Mater).
For the Christian, as for Mary, the obedience of faith can cost the price of intimate laceration, of personal deprivation, of trial. "And a sword will pierce your own soul too"
(Lk 2:35).
"The Virgin Mary, in the "journey of faith", reached the "night of faith", sharing in the suffering of her Son and the night of his tomb" (Catechism of the Catholic Church). The true disciple of Christ is not spared from fighting the great "battle of faith" (1 Tim 6:12), in the double sense of trial because of faith or in faith itself.
Temptation because of faith is constituted by persecution, which can culminate in martyrdom. This is the normal condition of the Christian, one must not hide it; instead, one must consciously prepare for it.
"All who desire to live a godly life in Christ Jesus will be persecuted."
(2 Tim 3:12).
Jesus had reminded his intimates: "Beware of men, for they will deliver you up to councils and flog you in their synagogues; and you will be led before rulers and kings for my sake... And you will be hated by all for my name's sake."
(Mt 10:17-18.22).
The words of the Gospel are echoed by the equally frank words of the Imitation of Christ: «Prepare yourself, therefore, as a brave and faithful servant of Christ, to manfully carry the cross of your Lord, crucified for your sake. Prepare yourself to have to endure many adversities and many inconveniences, in this miserable life. For so it will be for you, wherever you are; this, in reality, you will find, wherever you hide yourself. And it is a necessity that things be so. There is no remedy or escape from tribulation, evil or pain, except that you endure them. If you want to be a friend of the Lord and be his companion, drink his cup eagerly.
And would that you were worthy of suffering something for the name of Jesus! What great glory you would draw from it; what exultation the saints would have; and how much edification everyone would receive! Knowing how to suffer is something that everyone praises in words; but there are few who really want to suffer.
Know for certain that you must lead a life that dies; know that one progresses in the life of God the more one dies to oneself. In fact, no one can understand the things of heaven, if he is not able to endure adversity for Christ.
Nothing is more pleasing to God, nothing is more useful for you, in this world, than to suffer joyfully for Christ».
However, there are not only violent persecutions and bloody martyrdom. In fact, the Christian, because of the faith he professes in today's world, harshly opposed to Christ, to the Church and to the spirit of the Gospel, can very often encounter a deaf and underground opposition, subtle and piercing, no less painful and humiliating than open and violent persecution. How appropriate is the warning of Sirach: «Son, if you come to serve the Lord, prepare yourself for temptation.
Have a right heart and be constant, do not lose yourself in the time of seduction.
Stay united with Him without separating yourself from Him.
Accept what happens to you, be patient in painful events, because gold is tested by fire, and acceptable men in the crucible of pain. Trust in Him and He will help you".
(Sir 2, 1-6).
But one can also be tested in faith itself. Sometimes in fact the believer, even a fervent one, is assailed by insistent and tormenting doubts about the most fundamental truths of faith, has the terrible sensation that the ground of faith is disappearing from under his feet; he feels that the certainty of faith, which he has experienced other times in a strong experience, is crumbling; everything seems to dissolve: thick darkness envelops the soul.
Intellectual doubt is often accompanied by a state of apathy and spiritual aridity, which makes prayer difficult and the painful sensation that speaking to God is like talking to a wall, because on the other side it seems that no one responds. "My God, my God, why have you forsaken me? You are far from my salvation": these are the words of my lament.
My God, I call by day and you do not answer,
I cry by night and find no rest" (Ps 21:2-3).
This is not the time to question ourselves.
This is not the time to reason.
This is the time to transform ourselves like Mary into a "yes" that has the flavor of a holocaust pleasing to God for the salvation of the world.
Mary's humble, trusting and suffering yes introduced her into the infinite and eternal space of the Trinity, into the circle of fire of divinity. She thus became fruitful, in a marvelous crescendo marked by the ever deeper acceptance of the divine plan: with the incarnation she became the Mother of God (cf. Lk 1:35), in the shadow of the cross on Golgotha her motherhood extended in the order of grace to every man redeemed by her Son.
(cf. Jn 19:26).
"O Woman of faith, we cling to you. Welcome us into your heart.
We do not know how to stammer like newborn infants.
We do not know how to speak to God. We turn to you. Come to us.
May your unconditional "yes" to Love be ours, forever, O Mother."
