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| At the Main Altar of Holy Family Church |
Praised be Jesus, Mary, and Joseph!
The reason for the ritual of the
presentation of the child Jesus to God is a law that requires every firstborn
son to be consecrated to the Lord. This goes back to the night of the exodus
when God sent the angel of death to take the life of every first-born male
throughout the land of Egypt with the exemption of those who were behind the
doors marked by the blood of the slaughtered lamb. Every first-born son belongs to the Lord and he had to be
redeemed from the Lord at the price of an animal sacrifice…in the case of Mary
and Joseph, a pair of turtle doves which were the offering of the poor.
Obedient to the law, Mary and
Joseph brought the 40-day old Jesus to the temple to present him to the Lord.
Even without the ritual, the Lord Jesus already belongs to God. After all, God
is his Father. Remember our meditation on Christmas night? We said that Jesus
was born in one of the caves outside Bethlehem because there was no room in the
inn. This also signified that Jesus did not belong to the world. He belongs to
the Father. He is consecrated to the Father. He who is Mary’s first-born Son is
the Only Begotten Son of the Father. “And we have seen his glory: the glory of
the only begotten Son coming from the Father, full of grace and truth.”
And because he is consecrated to
the Father, he will be a sign that will be contradicted by many. He came to his
own and his own did not accept him. Contradicted will he be because he does not
belong to the world. His teachings will directly contradict the teachings of
the world. The values of the Kingdom are directly contradictory to everything
that the world holds dear: wealth, power, influence, pleasure… His consecration
to the Father was the reason for his life of obedience. He obediently accepted
death, death on a Cross.
Abraham was promised a son even
in his old age. When the promise was fulfilled, Abraham was put to the test. He
was asked to offer his son in a sacrifice…something which, though difficult,
Abraham was willing to do: “he who had received the promise was ready to offer
his son.” Of course we know that before the sacrifice was consummated, an angel
of the Lord kept Abraham from harming his boy. Isaac, Abraham’s son, became an
image of Jesus, the only Begotten Son of the Father. Like Abraham, the Father
was willing to offer his Son in the sacrifice on the Cross. But in his case,
there was no angel who came to abort the sacrifice. The sacrifice was
consummated. Christ obediently accepted death on the Cross. In the temple, Mary
brought in the Lamb of sacrifice, Jesus her Son, the Lamb of God who takes away
the sins of the world. Simeon foresaw that Jesus would have to suffer deeply
from those who rejected him and as a consequence, Mary would herself suffer
with him in her heart: “A sword will pierce your heart.” Mary, being the first
of the disciples, would be the very first to experience the hatred of the world
on account of her association with Jesus: If the world hates you, know that it
has hated me first. Like Mary, the disciple would have to suffer because he
belongs to Jesus, and belonging to Jesus, he belongs not to the world but to
the Father. Therefore, “Let us approach God who is thrice Holy to offer our
life and our mission, both personally and as a community of men and women
consecrated to the Kingdom of God. Let us make this inner gesture in profound
spiritual communion with the Virgin Mary. As we contemplate her in the act of
presenting the Child Jesus in the Temple, let us venerate her as the first and
perfect consecrated one, carried by the God whom she carries in her arms;
Virgin, poor and obedient, totally dedicated to us because she belongs totally
to God. At her school and with her motherly help let us renew our ‘here I am’
and our ‘fiat’." (Benedict XVI, Homily on the Presentation of the Lord,
2010.)
Jesus, I trust in you! O Mary
conceived without sin, pray for us who have recourse to thee!
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