Tuesday, December 14, 2004
Week Three, Day Three

Mary’s words are on Luke’s page before us. But how are we to hear and be reached by what God is saying to us through this song, appropriately named “The Magnificat”?

 First, we need to remember that we are listening to a spiritual conversation. Mary is responding to what her older cousin and spiritual friend, Elizabeth, has just said to her. (cf.1:39-45)  Elizabeth’s words were inspired by the Holy Spirit (cf. Lk.1:41).   They are words of affirmation that have encouraged Mary to disclose the divine truth she is carrying in her womb.

 What a relief that must have been to her to know Elizabeth was receptive and intensely interested in the secret Mary had come to share…needed to share.  Because of the deeply spiritual nature of this conversation, we need to hear Mary’s words with our sacred ear, the one the Holy Spirit gives us.

That brings us to the second thing we need to note about this passage.  Both women were filled with the Holy Spirit. Mary’s words are both song and prayer. They have to be, because what she is disclosing to Elizabeth and to us is beyond description and beyond rational comprehension alone. Awe and mystery has filled the room and is laced through the verses of this passage. We need to approach this passage with humble, prayerful hearts.

We also need to listen with a stillness of heart. Alfred Brendel wrote in the 4/1/96 issue of the New Yorker of what happens in a concert hall. “I like the fact that ‘listen’ is an anagram for ‘silent’. Silence is not something that is there before the music begins and after it stops. It is the essence of the music itself, the vital ingredient that makes it possible for the music to exist at all. It’s wonderful when the audience is part of this productive silence.” (quoted in Friends Of Silence Newsletter, June 2004)

Listening with a stilled, prayerful heart, we can begin to hear the eternal joy in Mary’s spirit as she “magnifies the Lord” and “rejoices in God my savior” and let this eternal joy reach us. We are able to marvel with Mary as she tells us that in her lowly estate she has found divine favor and realize the same can be true for us in our lowly estate.  As we let Mary sing to us of the awe and mystery of “the Mighty One,” our hearts can awaken to God’s majestic holiness in and around us.  Truly, this is a song for all generations to bless Mary and the Divine Son in her womb.

Mary’s song is filled with beauty and blessing to all who take the time to hear. It also contains profound spiritual wisdom. Mary states clearly the way God works in human life. God comes to and blesses those of low estate. God offers hope to the poor.  I do not believe that means God can only be found in the poor sections of town and not in affluent communities. However, I do believe while they offer hope for the poor, Mary’s words are a warning to the affluent. Affluence, as I have experienced it, numbs us from feeling the utter dependency we have on God for our lives and creates in us a false sense of what truly makes us secure.

Mary’s words in vs. 50 are for rich and poor alike: “His mercy is for those who fear him from  generation to generation”. However, material things, status, privilege, and intellectual knowledge easily blind us “the affluent” to our need for divine mercy and hide from our awareness our capacity for fear filled reverence for “the Mighty One”. Therefore, I think that we “the affluent” need to work harder to cultivate the humble spirit and contrite heart necessary to receive the divine mercy that makes us whole.

Prayer: God, humble our hearts and open them so we can join in Mary’s song of praise and rejoicing for the gift of your Son in our lives.  Amen.