Solemnity
of Mary, the Mother of God
Wednesday,
January 01, 2014
Luke
2:16-21
“And Mary kept all these things, reflecting on them
in her heart (Luk 2:19)”
How
do I start my New Year right? As a religious brother, my answer is straightforward.
I attended the first mass of the day and prayed the breviary afterward. I
believe that I have put my feet on the correct path. Yet, remarkably, none of
these liturgical activities are directly related to the New Year! In the first
day of the year, the Church is celebrating the solemnity of Mary, the Mary of
God and not New Year itself! But why? Before we reflect on an indirect relation
between New Year and this great festivity of the Church, let us first zero in
on the first ever Marian dogma ever defined.
For
non-Catholics, to call Mary as the mother of God is pretty idolatrous. If God
has a mother, Mary must be the highest goddess of all! The Catholics must fall
back to polytheism as they worship Mary like the ancient Greeks offered incense
to Hera, the supreme goddess of Olympus. But, for the well-informed Catholics,
the title ‘Mother of God’ does not point to the divinity of Mary, and in fact,
we never consider Mary as another supreme being. She is human just every one of
us, but she is so blessed because the Word was made flesh through her (Luk
1:31). Thus, in simple logic, we may say that Mary is the mother of Jesus and
Jesus is God, therefore, Mary is the Mothe r of God.
But,
why the council of Ephesus (in present-day Turkey) in 431 had to make a bold
move to define it as dogma? Was it enough to put it as an ordinary teaching of
the Church as to avoid misunderstanding? Delving into to the history and
theological controversies of the time, the council fathers found a need to
defend both the divinity as well as the humanity of Jesus as many heretics
considered humanity of Jesus as bogus. But, if Jesus were not God, how could He
save and if Jesus were not fully human, how could He bear our sins? Thus, our
forefathers taught that Jesus is truly God because he is coming from the
Father, and truly human, because He was truly born of Mary. To believe in this
dogma is a matter of salvation!
I
beg your indulgence if your nose start bleeding. Anyway, let us proceed with
the New Year stuffs. Why do we have to celebrate Marian festivity on the start
of the year? Why don’t we just create a New Year liturgical event and put this
solemnity in some other date? The first reason is that we need to respect the
history that our forefathers had placed this celebration in January 1. The
second reason is that the Church wants to remind us to start the New Year
right! To be right and true, we are called to be like Mary, to be the bearer of
God in our lives throughout the year, day in and day out. We give birth to
Christ every time we share our faith, every time we opt to be honest, and every
time we act to love difficult persons we encounter. We bring Jesus every moment
we do not lose hope on each other, every moment we defend the primacy of life,
and every moment we fight against injustice and violence.
To
start our year right, why don’t we make this New Year resolution: to be the
bearer of God!
Happy
New Year and Happy Feastday…
Br.
Valentinus Bayuhadi Ruseno, OP