Mary, the Immaculate Kecharitomene

Icon of St Anne, Mary, and Jesus

As we celebrate today the Solemnity of our Blessed Mother, the Immaculate Conception, my thoughts dwell on the richness of our Catholic tradition. The circumstances and details of the family life of Jesus in Nazareth is not recorded in the Gospels. What has been handed down to us came from a long line of tradition that stretches back to earliest Christianity. Mary's mother was named Anne, her father, Joachim. Sts. Joachim and Anne then are the grandparents of Jesus. We celebrate their feast on July 26 which we consider as grandparents' day.

It is important to note that such details were not recorded in the Bible because the early Christian writers were first preoccupied in writing the core of the Gospel message: the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ. Its beginnings saw Christianity struggle to form its distinct identity by anchoring itself in the Paschal mystery of Jesus. Only later did the Church begin to explore the other details of Jesus rich life.

The belief in the Immaculate Conception is rooted in the belief of the purity of Jesus. The writer of the Letter to the Hebrews would say that Jesus was like us in all things except sin (Hebrews 4:15). It is important to hold on to this truth because our salvation rests on the fact that the Son of God became man. Being God, the Second Person of the Trinity had to be incarnated as the Perfect Man for him to become a worthy thanksgiving to the Father in behalf of humanity. But to be born as a man, Jesus needs a mother from whom He will receive His humanity.

Mary was chosen beforehand to be the mother of Jesus. And so, in a singular grace granted to her, she was given the grace of being born without sin in order to prepare her for her role as the mother of Jesus. It is only right that the flesh and womb that would carry the Son of God for nine months be preserved from all stain of sin. But this grace is not given to her because she deserved it. Rather, it was given to her in view of Jesus. This grace of being free from sin is not something that is outside the work of Jesus. Rather it is something that we can call as a "preview" of the salvation that is to be won on the cross. It is the same salvation that we have received at Baptism except that Mary had a foretaste of it at her conception while we receive it after the cross through the water and the Spirit.

This is why our Blessed Mother is often called the Tabernacle because she would carry in her womb the Son of God in the same way our tabernacles in churches would hold the reposed consecrated bread. She is also called theotokos, meaning God-bearer for the same reason. To do this singular role, she was designated and prepared beforehand by the Father.

The angel Gabriel would affirm this her state when he would greet her: "Hail Mary, full of Grace! The Lord is with you!" A more faithful translation would be: "Rejoice, O Graced one! The Lord is with you!" The original Greek would highlight the relationship between joy (rejoice) and grace. Not only is Mary given grace by God but she is graced to to the full. We would say to her fullness because this grace is but a manifestation of the presence of God (Lord) in her life. This is so unique to her that St. Luke's Greek gave her a theological name: kecharitomene - a title that fully describes her unique role (Luke 1:28). Our Blessed Mother is the Kecharitomene.

The title Immaculate Conception is but a negative statement of the Kecharitomene. God and sin are mutually exclusive of one another. Sin the separation from God. To the Hebrew mind, it is 'missing the mark' of doing God's Will, the Law, which separates us from the righteousness of God. Not doing God's Will is separating, excluding, isolating ourselves from God (and not God separating Himself form us). Grace is its opposite: it is communion with God where we receive the fullness of God who is Grace Himself through whom we become just and saved. To be fully graced then is to be without sin!

Yet it is not our act that accomplishes this. It is only through God's mercy that these things happen. Mary was the recipient and God was the benefactor. She only completed this preparation given her when she said her fiat: "be it done to me according to your word" (Luke 1:38). If through her human nature God has dwelt like the fire that dwelt in the bush before Moses, now her 'yes' allowed for God to dwell in her womb. Grace prepared her to be the Mother of God.

The Immaculate Conception is the most proper solemnity to prepare us for the Birth of Jesus which we celebrate every Christmas. When we see the Madonna embracing the little Child, we see in her the representative of all humanity that has been longing to embrace and receive salvation. The little Child that slept soundly on her breast should be able to sleep soundly on our hearts. We might not have been conceived immaculately in the wombs of our mothers but we have been spiritually born immaculately in the womb of the Church when the waters of Baptism have completely washed away our sins. Let us maintain this purity through the practice of the virtue of chastity and allow Grace to dwell in us especially as we await the birth of Christ in our hearts.

Hope In A Messiah

Second Sunday of Advent

Holy Gospel of Jesus Christ according to Saint Matthew 3:1-12.
John the Baptist appeared, preaching in the desert of Judea
(and) saying, "Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand!"
It was of him that the prophet Isaiah had spoken when he said: "A voice of one crying out in the desert, 'Prepare the way of the Lord, make straight his paths.'"
John wore clothing made of camel's hair and had a leather belt around his waist. His food was locusts and wild honey.
At that time Jerusalem, all Judea, and the whole region around the Jordan were going out to him
and were being baptized by him in the Jordan River as they acknowledged their sins.
When he saw many of the Pharisees and Sadducees coming to his baptism, he said to them, "You brood of vipers! Who warned you to flee from the coming wrath?
Produce good fruit as evidence of your repentance.
And do not presume to say to yourselves, 'We have Abraham as our father.' For I tell you, God can raise up children to Abraham from these stones.
Even now the ax lies at the root of the trees. Therefore every tree that does not bear good fruit will be cut down and thrown into the fire.
I am baptizing you with water, for repentance, but the one who is coming after me is mightier than I. I am not worthy to carry his sandals. He will baptize you with the holy Spirit and fire.
His winnowing fan is in his hand. He will clear his threshing floor and gather his wheat into his barn, but the chaff he will burn with unquenchable fire."
  
Reflection
We all believe in a higher power. When computers started to become prevalent we thought that technology could further advance our civilization. And it did. As digital technology became smaller and smaller and moved from the desktop to the mobile we believed it would revolutionize the way we communicated. And it did. We thought that somehow, the better our technologies become the better the world we live in would be. We were wrong.

New technology bring with it advancements. It makes lives easier and speeds up development. But it also brings with it a whole new set of problems. Before the internet, the question of privacy is limited to the size and transparency of the window. Today, privacy is a battleground between the netizens and the surveillance groups, be it the state or not. WiFi availability is now one attraction for public spaces. Bullying has spilled online. Technology like any human tool is amoral. It brings with it its own solutions and its own unique set of problems.

We have always believed in technology. This is an indication that we believe in some higher power, something to carry us forward through the daily grind and the rough conditions of human existence. For some, technology have become their messiah, their savior, to which they invest resources in order to solve human problems. Human history, however, has shown that human technology while propelling civilization forward cannot be the sole solution. Human problems remain human. They come from human beings, perpetrated by human beings, and is to be solved by human beings. No other part of creation could solve our own problems except collective human effort.

Pope Benedict would point this out when he describes how humanity today is building a "kingdom of man" rather than the Kingdom of God. It is a kingdom whose chief architect is man and designed to build a utopia where human problems are past. Down through history, civilizations and religions have sought out a higher power to save humanity from its misery. Israel too yearned for a messiah, a savior for which the Prophet Isaiah spoke God's promises of salvation. Justice shall flourish in his time, and fullness of peace forever.

John the Baptist would echo this with much urgency. A savior is indeed coming, a savior not made by man but coming from God. He is not to build an earthly kingdom, a kingdom of man, but a kingdom of heaven, a Kingdom of God. This savior will not just bring solutions but will strike at the very root of the problem - the sinfulness of man. John the Baptist's call then is justified: repent!

The world that this savior will usher forth is so incompatible with ours that they are mutually exclusive. For this world to conform itself to the Kingdom of God the Spirit is to be invoked. Thus this Savior will baptize with the Spirit who is fire that purifies and burns the impurities. It is the Spirit that transforms man to the real humanity that God envisioned in him.

Jesus is that Savior foretold by John. He alone was filled with the Spirit. In the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ, the work of the Son and the action of the Spirit is gloriously revealed to us as the two hands of the Father working through humanity. Even God knew that human problems are solved humanely and that is why He sent His Son to become man - the perfect and ideal man who could teach us how to be truly human. Jesus will baptize the man and the world with the Spirit that it may be transformed to what it should be, the Kingdom of God.

How is this Kingdom seen today? Where Christians work for peace and sow love; where Christians bear with one another and forgive to end the cycle of hatred and war; where Christians go beyond themselves to become Jesus to others today - this is the ushering in of the Kingdom of God, this is the cleansing movement of the baptism of the Spirit. And as John points out to the Pharisees and Sadducees, this change must come from within, must come first from a personal transformation.

There would always be problems in the world. Suffering it seems is a consequence of human brokenness that manifests in each one of us. Technology would help, certainly, but it can never be the savior for humankind. We cannot craft our own salvation. We need a higher power and this higher power will come down among us to teach us how to be human. And in becoming human, we become a Kingdom of God.

First Sunday of Advent

Holy Gospel of Jesus Christ according to Saint Matthew 24:37-44.

Jesus said to his disciples: “As it was in the days of Noah, so it will be at the coming of the Son of Man. 
In (those) days before the flood, they were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, up to the day that Noah entered the ark.
They did not know until the flood came and carried them all away. So will it be (also) at the coming of the Son of Man. 
Two men will be out in the field; one will be taken, and one will be left.
Two women will be grinding at the mill; one will be taken, and one will be left. 
Therefore, stay awake! For you do not know on which day your Lord will come.
Be sure of this: if the master of the house had known the hour of night when the thief was coming, he would have stayed awake and not let his house be broken into. 
So too, you also must be prepared, for at an hour you do not expect, the Son of Man will come.
   

Reflection

We still find people lining outside Apple stores just to be one of the privileged ones to get their hands on an iPhone ahead of all creation. New technologies give us the craze these days. New features make us itch for the newest iteration of our gadgets. That Christmas is coming means many of us will be making our Christmas lists and fattening our wallets for the ultimate holiday shopping.

New things excite us because anything new brings with it hope. We want to be hopeful in this life. We want our lives to become a little better, a little bit lighter, a little bit easier. Sometimes we think that new technologies gives the solution to today's problems. But most of the time they bring with them their own new problems! But even so, we hope, we dream, and we strive.

The new liturgical season brings with it a new hope. This Sunday, the Church renews her cycle of worship synced with the life of Christ. It is the first Sunday of Advent and we are four weeks away from Christmas. Excitement is in the air. Rightly so, because Christmas is an event that brings with it great Hope. Advent prepares us to receive this Hope.

It is with a sense of mystery that the Gospel today speaks of the coming of the Son of Man. The title "Son of Man" is often used in the Old Testament, mostly in Daniel, to refer to the longed for savior of Israel, the Messiah. St. Matthew uses the title for Jesus. Here, Jesus speaks of his future coming at an hour we do not expect.

When we speak of hour we mean a time divinely set to fulfill something. Several hours have been set by God: our conception, our birth, and our death in the same way Jesus' hour of conception, birth, and death have been thought of by the Father before all the ages. The Church reminds us today of the threefold meaning of the hour of Jesus' coming.

The first hour was Jesus' birth which inaugurated His entrance into human history and with it the inauguration of our salvation won at the Cross. It has happened two thousand years ago and what we remember every Christmas. Yet it happened silently and peacefully without much fanfare. The second hour happens throughout our lives, when Jesus chooses to break through our lives. God surprises us with His Grace through events and people that lift us up and restores in us hope. Jesus lamented the fact that Jerusalem failed to recognize the hour of her visitation and He wept. The third hour is in an indeterminate future, in the final and definitive coming of Christ. No one really knows when despite the many claims of end-of-the-world that people have made.

The Gospel, however, does not speculate when these hours do happen. What it teaches us is to prepare because we do not know when the hour will come. We prepare for Christmas with the Advent season, preparing our hearts to receive Christ through repentance, going to Confession, and acts of charity. We prepare for Christ everyday by opening our lives to Jesus through a life of prayer and personal relationship with Him. And we prepare ourselves for our death and the future coming of Christ by living our lives well and holy.

This Advent season and Christmas shouldn't be something that happens every year in the same way it happened last year. Let us see our Christian lives in an ever closing spiral with Jesus at the center. As we go through His life throughout the year, from His birth, through ordinary life, together with His Passion, Death, and Resurrection, may we find ourselves getting closer and closer to Him every year.