Out of the mouths of babes…
I was recently discussing today’s Gospel reading, The Wedding Feast at Cana, with a friend. I asked why it was that Jesus did Mary’s bidding, though He believed His time had not yet come. Nine year old Elizabeth piped up without hesitation, “Because Mary was His Mother and even God has to obey His own Commandments. He had to honor His mother.”
Case closed.
The Spirit is strong with that little one. This isn’t the first time she has proven capable of confounding the Pontifical Biblical Commission. Her point is well made.
Jesus came to show us that it was possible to perfect ourselves according to His law. That perfection calls for submission to authority. Though He was God who took on human flesh, he chose Mary as His mother and was obliged to not merely obey her, but to be true to Himself in His own Words and honor her. She didn’t command Him, pull rank. She made her wishes known. That was enough. In honoring Mary, Jesus showed His complete obedience to His mother, as well as His Father in Heaven. It was through such obedience that He perfected Himself in His human nature.
In today’s Liturgy of the Hours, Office of Readings, we have this Reading:
From the Letter to the Ephesians by Saint Ignatius of Antioch, Bishop and Martyr
The harmony of unity
“It is right for you to give glory in every way to Jesus Christ who has given glory to you; you must be made holy in all things by being united in perfect obedience, in submission to the bishop and the presbyters.
“I am not giving you orders as if I were a person of importance. Even if I am a prisoner for the name of Christ, I am not yet made perfect in Jesus Christ. I am now beginning to be a disciple and I am speaking to you as my fellow-disciples. It is you who should be strengthening me by your faith, your encouragement, your patience, your serenity. But since love will not allow me to be silent about you, I am taking the opportunity to urge you to be united in conformity with the mind of God. For Jesus Christ, our life, without whom we cannot live, is the mind of the Father, just as the bishops, appointed over the whole earth, are in conformity with the mind of Jesus Christ.
“It is fitting, therefore, that you should be in agreement with the mind of the bishop as in fact you are. Your excellent presbyters, who are a credit to God, are as suited to the bishop as strings to a harp. So in your harmony of mind and heart the song you sing is Jesus Christ. Every one of you should form a choir, so that, in harmony of sound through harmony of hearts, and in unity taking the note from God, you may sing with one voice through Jesus Christ to the Father. If you do this, he will listen to you and see from your good works that you are members of his Son. It is then an advantage to you to live in perfect unity, so that at all times you may share in God.
“If in a short space of time I have become so close a friend of your bishop – in a friendship not based on nature but on spiritual grounds – how much more blessed do I judge you to be, for you are as united with him as the Church is to Jesus Christ, and Jesus Christ to the Father, so that all things are in harmony through unity. Let no one make any mistake: unless a person is within the sanctuary, he is deprived of God’s bread. For if the prayer of one or two has such power, how much more has the prayer of the bishop and the whole Church.”
So much of the Culture of Death springs from the radical autonomy that has characterized the Church over the past half-century, the marginalization of the Popes and Bishops by the laity. The rejection of Humanae Vitae and the embrace of contraception has led to the embrace of abortion, and now, euthanasia. Ignatius was a contemporary of the Apostles and their disciples, a member of the embryonic Apostolic Community. His is a voice that commands our attention.
We need to juxtapose our radical autonomy with not only the Ignatian community, but with the obedience of Jesus to Mary, even though as God, He would have preferred to do otherwise. In doing so, we are left entirely without excuse.
Coming Home 
Scripture backs her too. After finding the 12 year old Jesus in the Temple we read at the end of the episode:
“And he went down with them and came to Nazareth, and was obedient to them; and his mother kept all these things in her heart” [Luke 2:51]
Peace
Dr. Nadal, I have been following your blog for awhile and always find it insightful. I hope you don’t mind but I posted a link to this article on my own blog because I found it very helpful. God bless.
Matthew
“If in a short space of time I have become so close a friend of your bishop – in a friendship not based on nature but on spiritual grounds – how much more blessed do I judge you to be, for you are as united with him as the Church is to Jesus Christ, and Jesus Christ to the Father, so that all things are in harmony through unity. Let no one make any mistake: unless a person is within the sanctuary, he is deprived of God’s bread. For if the prayer of one or two has such power, how much more has the prayer of the bishop and the whole Church.”
“Ignatius was a contemporary of the Apostles and their disciples, a member of the embryonic Apostolic Community. His is a voice that commands our attention.”
How important for us to remember the contemporary nature of the relationship between Ignatius, the Bishops, and other evangelists with Jesus and His Church!