In the Name of the Father, the Son and the Holy Ghost.
I should like to say a few words about the greatness of this feast. When
a man surveys this world in which we live, which is so vast, seemingly
boundless, and looks at himself in it, he feels very small and
insignificant. And if he adds to this the hardness and coldness of men,
he may sometimes feel extremely vulnerable, helpless and unprotected
both before people and before the terrifying vastness of the world.
Yet at the same time if a man looks at himself not in relation to his
surroundings, but goes deep into himself, he will there discover such an
expanse, such depths, that the whole created world is too small to fill
it. Man sees the beauty of the world — and the vision does not
completely satisfy him; he learns an enormous amount about God's
creation — and the knowledge does not fill him to the brim. Neither
human joy nor even human sorrow can completely fill a man, because in
him is a depth that exceeds everything created; because God made man so
vast, so deep, so limitless in his spiritual being, that nothing in the
world can finally satisfy him except God Himself.
Today's feast of the Mother of God demonstrates this fact with
particular beauty and splendour. She so believed in God, She gave
herself to Him with such a pure mind and pure heart, with an unwavering
will, with the purity of Her virginity and life such that She was
granted to say the Name of God perfectly, with such love that the Word
became flesh and God was made man in Her.
Through this we are shown that not only is the soul, the inner being and
spirit of man, so created by God that it can contain the mystery of a
meeting with the living God, but that even the body is so made that in
an unfathomable way it can be united with the living God. Indeed,
according to St. Peter we are called to become partakers of the divine
nature; according to St. Paul our vocation is to become temples of the
Holy Spirit. The whole of the New Testament teaches us that we are the
Body, the living tremulous Body of Christ, through baptism and through
Holy Communion. How wonderful this is, and therefore with what reverence
must we regard not only our immortal soul, but this body of ours which
is called to rise again, to enter the Kingdom of God and be glorified,
like the body of Christ.
In the XI century St. Simeon the New Theologian wrote one day when he
had returned to his humble cell after receiving Holy Communion, words to
this effect, "I look upon this corruptible body, upon this frail flesh,
and I tremble, because by partaking of the Holy Mysteries it has been
permeated by God, it has been united with Christ, it is overflowing with
the Holy Spirit... these powerless hands have become the hands of God,
this body has become a body that God has taken possession of."
Consider what has been given us not only by our faith, but by the
sacraments of the Church. The immersion in the blessed waters of Baptism
makes us particles, living members of Christ's Body, the Anointing with
Holy Chrism is not only the visible seal of the Holy Spirit, but makes
us the temples in which He dwells. When the bread and wine which are
offered by our faith and love to God are consecrated, they become
incomprehensibly and mysteriously the Body and Blood of Christ, and this
created matter partakes of Christ and imparts to us, who are incapable
of soaring to God in spirit, the divinity of Christ, which saves and
transfigures us in soul and body.
This feast of Nativity of the Mother of God is the time when we remember
the birth of the One who for the sake of us all, for the whole human
race, was able to show such faith, to surrender so absolutely to God,
that He could become Man through Her, and bring us these manifold,
unfathomable gifts. Glory to Her humility, glory to Her faith, glory to
Her love, glory to God Who was incarnate and to the Virgin Mother of
God, the worthy vessel of the incarnation of the Son of God, Christ our
God! Amen.
