… faith can either be “living” or “dead.” A living faith, a faith that saves us, is a faith that moves towards lives poured out in love for God and neighbor… faith is so much more than a list of thing we believe in. Christian faith is about laying down our lives, in real, concrete acts of love…
… Christ crucified… hanging between the heaven above and the earth below, with a blasphemer on his left and a thief on his right, our Lord offered to God the purest sacrifice of love ever to come forth from the heart of man… Mary… witnessed the love of Jesus for his Father… heard his cry of thirst… gazed upon his opened heart… consented to his sacrifice, offering her whole self, her motherhood, with him as a living sacrifice of praise to God. Her faith united her in love to God. Her love for God brought her to love for Christ on the cross. Her love for Christ on the cross brought her to a life of loving service for John, the apostles, and the whole church…
When we love someone, we naturally regret the things we have done to hurt them and we intensely desire to reciprocate any love they show us… since the root of sinfulness is a lack of love; our way away from sin and towards God will be along the path of love…
Christ crucified invites us to love the Father with him and through him. He invites us to lay down our lives for our brothers just as he did. Mary accepted that invitation and became the mother of the Crucified and the Mother of the Church…
Blessed Mother Teresa of Calcutta used to say that it was not so important to do extraordinary things, but to do ordinary things with extraordinary love… As St. Therese of Lisieux so beautifully exclaimed, “To love, I only have today.”
And his father and his mother marveled at what was said about him; and Simeon blessed them and said to Mary his mother, “Behold, this child is set for fall and rising of many in Israel, and for a sign that is spoken against (and a sword will pierce through your own soul also), so that the thoughts out of many hearts may be revealed. Lk 2:33 – 35
Mary… is, indeed, the “admirable mother,” the mother who lived the fullness of her motherhood with respect to Jesus by living the same mission as him all the way to the end – by accepting everything in faith without full understanding.
Mary, indeed, lived the mystery of the cross in a total darkness (and therefore in a hope coming out of a total poverty), but also in a burning love (one in which everything is given) with Jesus and for him and for the Father… she who suffered infinitely more than we have suffered is capable of understanding our sufferings, all of our pains, all of our sadness, all the forms of rejection that we endure. She is capable of understanding them, because she lived them even more fully than we did…
With Mary, we should bear all the sufferings of our brothers – especially the inner suffering, the deep wounds that no one wants to admit, but which Mary lovingly bore as our mother when she received the piercing of the sword in the depths of her heart in order that these secrets might be revealed to her… through the wound of the heart of Jesus and the wound of the heart of Mary, pierced by seven swords, may we deeply discover the mystery of the love of the Father for us and for all men.
With Open Hands 