| |
Marist Family
Retreat 1999
The
'New Church' in the context of Marist Spirituality
Jan
Hulshof sm
Our
Resources | Our Call | Our
Model | Our Priorities
| Our Hope
3.
Our MODEL.
3.1 ‘BLEST WHO HEAR THE WORD’ (Lk 11:27)
3.2 MARY MODEL OF THE CHURCH
‘While he was
saying this a woman from the crowd called out, ‘Blest is the
womb that bore you and the breasts that nursed you!’ ‘Rather,
he replied, blest are they who hear the word of God and keep
it.’
We seem to have
here in Luke 11:27f. a variant of the saying on the true kinsfolk
of Jesus in Luke 8:19f. In Luke 8 it is the visit of the relatives
of Jesus who wish to see Him, that provides the occasion for
the saying concerning the true kinsfolk of Jesus: ‘My mother
and my brothers are those who hear the word of God and act
upon it’. In Luke 11 it is the cry of the woman from the crowd
extolling the privileges of the mother of Jesus that provides
the occasion for the saying: ‘Rather blest are they who hear
the word of God and keep it.’ This cry of the woman from the
crowd is very expressive and typical of oriental culture.
There are three elements in her cry. First of all what she
really wants to extol is not the mother but the son. Secondly
she extols the son by extolling the mother. And in the third
place she extols the mother by extolling the physical symbols
of motherhood and fertility: the womb that bore him and the
breasts that nursed him. There are quite a number of parallels
in rabbinical literature. For instance Rabbi Abba b. Zutra
said (about 270) a similar word about Rahel, the mother of
Joseph and there also the mother is extolled because of the
son: ‘Blest are the breasts that nursed him and blessed is
the womb that bore him’.
Crucial
for the understanding of the saying of Jesus is the Greek
particle ‘Menoun’ used by Luke at the beginning. This little
word sometimes confirms what is stated, “yea, verily”; sometimes
adds to what is said, with or without confirming it, but virtually
correcting it: “yea rather”, or “that may be true, but”. If
that is what the word means, Jesus does not deny the woman’s
statement, but He points out how inadequate it is. She has
missed the main point. To be the mother of Jesus implies a
share in His humanity. To hear and keep the word of God implies
communion with what is Divine’ . In the story of the infancy
the mother appears as the faithful disciple. In reply to the
cry of the woman of the crowd, the disciples are called blest
by Jesus. When she visits Elizabeth, Mary is called blest
because she trusted that the Lord’s words to her would be
fulfilled . The saying about the true kinsfolk of Jesus might
at first glance seem a bit harsh towards his mother, but they
do not take away anything of the high reverence shown to Mary
in the Gospel of Luke. On the contrary, the mother of Jesus
is for Luke the figure or type of the Christian community.
‘She acquiesces fully, as the Christian should, to the mystery
of God’s word’. And therefore, according to St. Augustine,
even the Christian virgins share in the motherhood of Mary,
since they are oriented towards doing the will of God: ‘Rejoice,
you virgins of Christ: your companion is the mother of Christ.
Reminder of the word of Christ: Whoever does the will of my
Father in heaven, is my mother. Therefore you too are mothers
of Christ, because you fulfil the will of His Father. You
too conceive Christ by your faith, you too bring Him into
the world by your good works. May then your heart give to
the Law of Christ, what Mary’s womb gave to His body.’
Still Luke, while
avoiding to play off the faithful disciple against the mother,
does point at the hierarchy of values regarding the person
of the mother herself. Mary’s faith seems to be more important
to Jesus than Mary’s motherhood. C.G. Montefiore, as a liberal
Jew, did not fail to notice that, after all, the attitude
of Jesus is difficult to digest in Jewish tradition with its
very high esteem of fertility and motherhood. He comments:
‘Physical relationship to the Master is [for Jesus] not the
highest relationship. Most blessed are they who listen to
the word of God, which he teaches, and perform it. However
correct this may be, Montefiore says, there is a certain depreciation
of the most sacred of human relationships which is out of
harmony with Jewish feeling. Verses of this kind would, I
fancy, be impossible in a purely Jewish book.’ In Jewish tradition
there is something sacred about everything which has to do
with family, clan and people. Therefore in this saying of
Jesus we trace one of the original and unique features of
Jesus. It’s no longer the family, the clan, the people which
is the essential frame of reference. What is really sacred
is the human being in his personal and free obedience to the
Word of God. Mary’s motherhood is clearly subservient to her
discipleship. It looks as if Jesus here as elsewhere in the
synoptic Gospels reacts in advance against all kinds of tendencies
to extol Mary’s motherhood over the primacy of faith, i.e.
to dissociate the mother of Jesus from the community of those
who hear the Word of God and keep it.
But Montefiore
touched only one aspect of the religious and social revolution
contained in the saying of Jesus. Jesus does not only say
that faith and discipleship are more important than motherhood,
he also says that a mother is not only important because of
her son, but first of all because of the person she is, touched
by the love of God, touched by the Word of God and invited
to give her personal answer. In that perspective, Rahel is
not only important because she is the mother of Joseph. She
is important because she is Rahel. She is not only important
because of the story of Joseph and Israel, of their faith
and of their sufferings, she is important because of her own
story, of her own faith, of her own sufferings. Of course,
Mary is mentioned in the gospels, because she is the mother
of Jesus. But Jesus himself wants to underline that she is
not only important because she is the mother of some-one else,
unique though He is, but because she hears the word of God
and keeps it. In a glimpse I remember an experience in Pakistan,
when I got the chance to visit the Marists there, among them
Roger McCarrick, who at the end of the seventies and in the
beginning of the eighties ran a school in Lahore. Also children
of rich Moslem families went to that college. In the morning
the boys were taken to the college by car, the father behind
the wheel, in the forefront next to him his son, and, almost
invisible on the back seat the mother, covered by a veil.
Jesus, as it were, puts the woman in the forefront of the
car and invites her to take off her veil. She appears not
only as the mother of the son and the wife of the husband,
but as the unique person she is.
We all know that
the catholic tradition in the past, at times put Mary in the
forefront to such an extent that she almost outshone Christ.
Then, as a reaction, we started saying that Mary as such is
of no importance and that she is just an instrument in view
of the redemption of Christ. But however in the theology of
Luke the image of Mary is not wiped out by the overpowering
light of the image of Christ. In a certain sense Mary is more
than an instrument. The word ‘instrument’ has the connotation
of a passive object in the hands of somebody else. But Luke
makes clear that Mary is a subject. Her personal act of faith
is crucial in the history of salvation: ‘I am the servant
of the Lord. Let it be done to me as you say.’ Her relation
to God is more than purely instrumental. It has something
to do with partnership and therefore her person is not wiped
out after the birth of Jesus: ‘All ages to come shall call
me blessed.’
In this
perspective I like the magnificent ‘Coronation of the Virgin’
in the apse of the Santa Maria Maggiore in Rome, created by
Giacopo Torriti at the end of the 13th century, the supreme
achievement of the art of Roman mosaic workers. We see Christ
who is going to crown Mary and both are represented practically
as Juxtaposed. The mosaic recalls the messianic royal couple
of psalm 45, the responsorial hymn of the feast of Assumption:
‘At your right hand stands the queen in gold of Ophir'. I
remember that, a couple of years ago, I visited Santa Maria
Maggiore with a group of Dutch friends, from the Council of
Churches, mainly stainless steel Calvinists, who were taught
by the Heidelberg Catechism that man is ‘perverted and totally
incapable of any good and inclined to every evil’ ('alzoo
verdorven, dat wij ganschelijk onbekwaam zijn tot eenig goed
en geneigd tot alle kwaad').
They admired
the work of art, but couldn’t help asking me whether such
a representation of Mary would not come very close to idolatry.
The Italian lady, a student in the history of art, who was
our guide, came into the discussion, a little bit annoyed,
and said: ‘Christ and Mary are juxtaposed. Nothing wrong
with that. Is there? Why shouldn’t Mary be portrayed alongside
Christ? Because she is a woman?’ ‘No, no, the protestant
ministers hastened to answer, but because she is just a
creature and might outshine Christ.’ But the Italian girt,
not at all put off went on: ‘If an excellent violin teacher
has a talented student, that won’t diminish her, would it?
On the contrary, she would be proud of her student and proud
of herself and she would feel happy to coach her student’s
talent. That the student opens out and blossoms, that won’t
diminish her teacher? In the same way I don’t believe that
the coronation of Mary would diminish God or Christ.’
Because
of her unconditional personal commitment, because of her faith
and obedience, because of her love of God and men Mary has
been, is and will be the model, par excellence, of the disciple
of Jesus. She is the model of the new community of believers.
Everybody can identify with her, you don’t need to be an apostle
or a teacher or a priest to identify with her. Mary does not
represent a special ministry in the body of the Church, nor
a special service, she represents the Heart of the Church,
which is love. She represents really what Saint Thérèse of
Lisieux call’s the ‘the small way’ of the soul of God. The
most beautiful comment I still find in her letter to Soeur
Marie du Sacré Coeur of 8th September 1896: ‘I looked at the
mystical body of the Church and I couldn’t identify with any
of the members described by St. Paul or rather I wanted to
identify with each of them... Love became for me the key of
my vocation. I understood that if the Church had a body, composed
of different members, she would not fail to have what is most
needed and most noble. I understood that the Church had a
Heart and that this Heart was burning with Love. I understood
that only Love would incite the members of the Church to act,
and that, when the fire of Love would have gone out, the Apostles
no longer would announce the Gospel, the Martyrs would refuse
to shed their blood... I understood that Love contained every
vocation, that Love was all, that Love covered all the times
and all places...; in one word, that Love was eternal.’
Fr. Colin
continuously presents Mary to us as the model of our life.
‘The very name indicates the banner under which the Society
desires to serve in fighting the battles of the Lord, and
what its spirit should be. It is distinguished by this tender
name, Society of Mary: so that all who are admitted into
it, mindful of the family to which they belong may understand
they are to emulate the virtues of this loving Mother, as
if living her life, above all in humility, obedience, self-denial,
mutual charity, and the love of God.’
Humility,
obedience, self-denial, mutual charity, and the love of God:
it’s the Heart of the Gospel, the Heart of the Church, its
after all very simple, but not easy. As human beings we need
models. We are attracted and inspired by persons for whom
God, who is mighty has done great things. This applies most
of all to Mary, presented to us as our model, not only by
Fr. Colin, but also by Saint Luke in his Gospel. But no model,
not even Mary, can relieve me of the responsibility to give
a personal answer in faith to God’s call, as Mary had to give
it. Discipleship and following of Jesus is a highly personal
affair that none of us can delegate to someone else. God created
every person as a unique being. He didn’t make copies. In
that sense nobody should be the copy nor should anyone be
the model of someone else. According to one of the Hasidic
stories, in his dying hour rabbi Susja of Hanipol was talking
to one of his disciples. The disciple tried to encourage his
master and said: ‘You shouldn’t be afraid! We all know how
courageously you always followed the footsteps of Moses. Since
you, all your life, tried to follow Moses, the Eternal One
will show his mercy to you.’ The dying rabbi however, was
not too much impressed by this pious talk and he answered:
‘In the world to come I’ll not be asked why I failed to become
Moses, but why I failed to become Susja’. To emulate and imitate
Mary doesn’t mean to simply hand over the wheel to Mary, but
to be inspired by Mary to say unconditionally ‘Yes’ to God
in the situation of our life, as she did in her life.
I know
Marists who feel insecure with regard to the biblical base
of our spirituality. They are in doubt as to whether the Marist
spirituality fits into the Church renewal stimulated by the
Second Vatican Council. I believe our tradition helps us enter
into one of the inspiring perspectives of the Second Vatican
Council concerning the Church and its renewal. Fr. Coste used
to say that if we want to know the way Colin looks at the
Church, we should carefully listen to what he says about Mary,
This is true also with respect to the Council. How the Council
looks at the Church shows in the way it speaks of Mary. The
mere fact that it placed the document on Mary, on the 29th
of October 1963, within the document on the Church, is significant.
This was not just a matter of redaction, but an indication
of how the bishops saw Mary and also of how they saw the Church.
A minority, led by cardinal Santos of Manila, insisted on
the exceptional place and privileges of Mary by which she
is elevated above the People of God. Their image of Mary reminds
me of the enormous statue of Mary, 16 meters high, that, in
1860, was placed on top of the Roman Cathedral of Notre Dame
de France of Le Puy dominating the district of Velay, or,
less spectacular, the statue of Mary on top of the mountain
that dominates the village of Cerdon. The majority, led by
cardinal Konig of Vienna, saw Mary as a pilgrim, wrapped in
her pilgrim's garb, among the apostles, in the midst of God’s
pilgrim people, as we see her for instance in the illustration
of the Rabula Codex of the 5th century. In chapter eight of
Lumen Gentium, Mary indeed is called a ‘member of the Church’
, pre-eminent it is true, but yet a member, with her sisters
and brothers in the faith. Inside the Church she surpasses
all creatures, not as a priest (she is a lay-person), not
as man (she is a woman), not as a member of a religious elite
(she comes from Nazareth), and not even as the mother of Jesus
according to the flesh, but by her faith and her love.
According
to the fathers of the Council, Mary demonstrates how the Church
should be ‘in the order of faith, charity and perfect union
with Christ’ . A Church that calls her ‘its model’, thereby
describes itself. The emphasis is not only on a Church that
holds the means of grace and that is endowed with responsibility
of teaching and governance, however indispensable this may
be. The emphasis is even more on the community of faith, which
resembles Mary who opens her heart for the Word of God and
‘progresses in faith, hope and charity, seeking and doing
the will of God, imitating Christ ’. This is the way Lumen
Gentium portrays the Marian profile of Church. The last chapter
of Lumen Gentium offers a key to the reading of the whole
Constitution of the Church. The council, as we know, indeed
gives priority to what all people in the Church have in common.
It most certainly shows a high esteem for the hierarchy, but
before talking of the hierarchy (in chapter three) and of
the laity (in chapter four) the Council speaks in chapter
one of the mystery of the Church in which we all share, and,
in chapter two, of the People of God to which we all belong,
to which non catholic Christians should feel tied themselves
and to which non-Christian believers and all people of good
will are ordained. The church is ‘seed of unity, hope and
salvation for the whole human race’. ‘communion of life and
love and truth’, ‘instrument for salvation of all’, ‘light
of the world and salt of the earth’ . The Church is community
and called upon to build community in the world. This calling
is founded on Baptism. Every baptised person shares in the
one priesthood of Christ and in His one prophetic ministry
. It is only after affirming these priorities that the Council
deals with the offices in the Church ‘which aim at the good
of the whole body’ . The holders of office do not govern a
collectivity but a communion ‘so that all who belong to the
People of God, and are consequently endowed with true Christian
dignity, may, through their free and well-ordered efforts
towards a common goal, attain to salvation’ . Diversity of
graces and ministries does not detract from the unity of the
Church, because ‘all these things are the work of the one
and the same spirit ’ and therefore a source of unity. The
diversity of graces, ministries and offices has to serve the
life of the community of believers. Therefore prior to taking
up religious life (chapter six), Lumen Gentium speaks, in
chapter five, of the one calling of all the faithful to perfect
holiness. ‘All Christians in any state or walk of life are
called to the fullness of Christian life and to the perfection
of love’ . The religious vocation is not described in contrast
to the calling of the laity. The Council does not think in
terms of better and worse. There is a wide diversity in the
ways to holiness: of married and non-married people, of sick
people and working people, of laity, religious and ordained
ministers. Each state of life is a way to holiness and it
is precisely the diversity that creates community. ‘The forms
and tasks of life are many, but holiness in one ’.
This
conciliar vision of Mary is of great ecumenical importance
and it inspires the people of God from various denominations
to come together around Mary as they do in Walsingham. Numbers
68 and 69 of Lumen Gentium show Mary as ‘the image and beginning
of the Church as it is to be perfected in the world to come
’, ‘a sign of certain hope and comfort to the pilgrim people
of God’ . Looking towards Mary, the Church knows that it must
strive to be what in Mary it already is, ‘without spot or
wrinkle ’ Pope John Paul II, in his Encyclical ‘Redemptoris
Mater’, quotes these texts and underlines their ecumenical
relevance. ‘By a more profound study of both Mary and the
Church, clarifying each by the light of the other, Christians
. . . will be able to go forward together on this pilgrimage
of faith. Mary, who is still the model of this pilgrimage,
is to lead them to the unity which is willed by the one Lord'
. Lumen Gentium radiates the joyful faith that Mary will bring
all Christians together. She goes beyond confessions and embodies
what is most essential in Christian life: faith, hope and
love. In Mary the gifts of the Church one, holy, catholic
and apostolic are already fully realised. The Church on earth
shares in these gifts, but, as long as it still is ‘on the
way’, it will always be to a limited extent only. Our sister
Churches are not the only ones to fall short of unity, because
they lack full communion with the Catholica. Cut off from
its sister Churches, the Roman Catholic Church itself is likewise
flawed. Insofar as Mary is the foreshadowing of the healed
Church at the end of time, she transcends the divisions that
keep us apart at present. In conclusion we can say that Lumen
Gentium does not see Mary as a stumbling-block for ecumenism,
on the contrary, in the last sentence of chapter eight, also
the last sentence of the Constitution as such, Mary appears
as the great advocate of an ecumenism that encompasses all
Churches, all religions and all people of good will. Marists,
will find this text particularly inspiring, especially when
meditating this text parallel to a basic Marist text, number
109 of the Summarium Regularum of 1833. The Council says:
‘The entire body of the faithful pours forth urgent supplications
to the Mother of God that she, who aided the beginnings of
the Church by her prayers, may now, exalted as she is above
all the angels and saints, intercede before her Son in the
fellowship of all the saints, until all families of people,
whether they are honoured with the title of Christians or
whether they still do not know the Saviour, may be happily
gathered together in peace and harmony into the one People
of God, for the glory of the Most Holy and undivided Trinity’.
For many
Marists chapter eight of Lumen Gentium was a confirmation
of their charism. The General Chapter of 1969-1970 felt that
the Council had proclaimed in doctrinal and theological language
what Fr. Colin within the context of his own time had intuitively
foreshadowed, namely that the Church will enter into real
renewal only to the extent that it takes after Mary, its model,
its excellence. The draft Constitutions of 1977 echo Lumen
Gentium where it is said:
‘Our communities witness to the Church’s desire
to grow nearer its perfect image in Mary,
a Church which perseveres in its search for Jesus Christ,
a servant Church,
not wanting to domineer,
without place of privilege,
concerned only that He be proclaimed.’
The
Constitutions of 1987 asks Marists to make their own a Marian
vision of the Church. Another echo can be heard in number
10: by growing in holiness, by working for the salvation of
their neighbour, and by labouring for the cause of the Catholic
faith, Marists will help to renew the Church in Mary’s image.
A Church in the model of Mary gives priority to love and faith.
It is a servant Church, constantly on the pilgrimage of faith;
a Church that is first and foremost concerned with communion,
a communion that enhances all, in faith, hope and charity.
The coincidence of the results of Marist studies by Coste
and Lessard and the teachings of the Second Vatican Council
made the Marian Church into an inspiring vision for many Marists.
One of the Marists who put this vision quite impressively
into words, is Françoise Marc. Several Marists present here,
met him in La Neylière in 1995, less than one year before
he died at the age of 46. I am grateful to Craig Larkin who
included the English translation of his ‘Plea for a Marian
Church’ into his exploration of Marist spirituality ‘A Certain
Way’: ‘I would like to plead for a Marian Church; not for
a church which multiplies processions and blesses huge statues
. . . rather a Church which lives the Gospel after the manner
of Mary . . . The Marian Church knows that she is the object
of a gratuitous love, and that God has the heart of a mother
. . . The Marian Church does not know the answers before the
questions are posed . . . The Marian Church lives in Nazareth
in silence and simplicity . . . The Marian Church stands at
the foot of the Cross . . . The Marian Church lets in the
wind of Pentecost . . . There, at the foot of the Cross a
people was born, a Marian people . . . Brothers and sisters,
let us belong to this people. Let us make a place for Mary
in our home. Let us enter with her into the “humble and heart-rending
happiness” of loving and being loved. And, in the words of
Thérèse de Lisieux, the Church will be in this world “a heart
resplendent with love”.’
The encyclicals
Marialis Cultus (1974) of Paul VI and Redemptoris Mater (1987)
and Mulieris Dignitatem (1988) of John Paul II confirm and
elaborate the conciliar vision of Mary. Most remarkable is
a passage in Mulieris Dignitatem, the encyclical of John Paul
II on women. The ‘Marian Profile of the Church’ says the Pope,
is more fundamental and characteristic than ‘its apostolic
and Petrine profile.’ Through its Marian profile the Church
manifests the love of the bride for the bridegroom. Its apostolic
and Petrine profile represents the hierarchical ministry of
proclamation, of administering the sacraments and of governance.
All such ministry, says the Pope, is at the service of the
Marian dimension of the Church. The Church is both, ‘Marian’
and ‘Apostolic-Petrine’. As a modern theologian has put it
so well: Mary is ‘Queen of the Apostles without pretensions
to apostolic powers: she has other and greater powers’ . Although
this statement is part of the argument against the ordination
of women, it still is remarkable that the hierarchical element
is subordinated to the Marian one. The Catechism of the Catholic
Church recently reaffirmed these teachings of John Paul II
when stating that the structure of the Church is totally ordained
to the sanctity of the members of Christ and that the Marian
Dimension of the Church is antecedent to the Petrine, because
Mary precedes all of us in the sanctity which is the mystery
of the Church, Bride without spot or wrinkle . Pope John Paul
II and the Catechism of the Catholic Church say in terms of
doctrine what Colin has said in terms of spiritual intuition:
‘Mary did more than the apostles for the new-born Church;
she is Queen of the Apostles, but she did it without any stir,
she did it above all with her prayers’ .
At first
sight all this may sounds a bit abstract and theoretical.
The reason why I dwell on it, has to do with the challenges
that our communities and our Society are faced with. To have
Mary as model of our faith, as model of our Church and as
model of our Society, is of course full of implications for
the priorities we establish. To end with I refer again to
an observation reported by Craig Larkin in his beautiful book
‘A Certain Way’:
‘In
1986 the CBS-TV team produced a series of four programmes
on the Church in Latin America. The series covered the work
of the Church in Lima, Peru, in Sao Paulo, Brazil, and in
Managua, Nicaragua. These places were chosen because they
showed the many diverse challenges facing the Church in Latin
America. In Peru and Brazil, the CBS team followed the work
of Marists working in both these countries. Callao in Peru
has a population of close to one million Catholics, there
are few jobs available, there is massive poverty, and not
much hope for economic change. The Marist parish of St. Rose
runs a food bank which provides breakfast for about 500 school
children each morning. In Brazil, Marists serve in Sao Paulo,
which is the largest archdiocese in the world. They work among
those whose chances of economic improvement are minimal. At
the end of the filming, CBS producer John Santos said: ‘What
impressed me tremendously in the filming of the programs is
the quiet dedication of the Marists we met along the way.
On the one hand we met the great thinkers and the Church hierarchy,
but on the other hand we met the profound ministry of the
Marists who put all of the talk into action.’
Jan Hulshof sm.
|
