Mary's Willpower
A Homily for The Memorial of the Immaculate Heart of Mary
(Luke 2:41-51)

“Son, why have you done this to us?”

This question of the Virgin Mary to her divine Son parallels her question to the Angel Gabriel. To Gabriel announcing that she was to be the Mother of the Son of God, she said, “How can this be since I have no relations with a man?”

The words of the angel thrust her into a struggle of faith. Should she believe him? How to reconcile motherhood with her virginal state? Now, the actions of her Son have thrown her into consternation. flow to understand, and by understanding, humbly and graciously submit to such conduct by her young Son, not just now, but for all it portends for the future?

The struggle the angel precipitated and the struggle brought on by her Son’s conduct show certain parallels and vast differences. The former struggle was of faith against humility; the latter, of obedience against self-will. Learning how Mary wins out in both cases will help us in our own struggles.

If I may make bold to say it, in the case of being called to be Mother of God, the honor was so great, what sane person would refuse, unless she could not see how it could be, or unless it be from some excessive humility?

Mary’s question to Gabriel makes it clear that she is hesitating because she can’t see how this call is compatible with her virginal state. How could she, a virgin, bear a child as the angel was saying?

But Mary’s hesitation, according to St. Bernard, had roots in her humility as well. In meditating on the Annunciation, St. Bernard puts himself right into the event, and cries out to Mary about our plight. “Answer quickly, 0 Virgin,” he says. “Why do you delay, why are you afraid? Believe, give praise, and receive. Let humility be bold, let modesty be confident. This is no time for virginal simplicity to forget prudence. In this matter alone, 0 prudent Virgin, do not fear to be presumptuous. Though modest silence is pleasing, dutiful speech is now more necessary. Open your heart to faith, 0 blessed Virgin, your lips to praise, your womb to the Creator.” And Mary cries out, “Behold the handmaid of the Lord. Be it done to me according to your word” (Divine Office, December 20).

Now, three days of anguish brought on by her Son’s conduct face Mary with a different struggle, one in which she has to win out, not over humility, but over pride and self-will. Now the issue is submission to God’s purpose and plan even though she can’t understand it. Now, the glory of radiant motherhood doesn’t await her, but submission to suffering, deprivation, anguish and sorrows almost beyond bearing: submission to God’s wisdom and God’s will; submission to the same battle her Son would have to fight to subject his human will to the Father, the battle that reached its height in the Agony in the Garden.

Her Son answers her question: “Why were you looking for me? Did you not know that I must be in my Father’s house?” The answer did not resolve the problem that led to Mary’s question; it only provides her with a mystery to ponder: Am I to cooperate with God’s will and God’s affairs even when I can’t understand, even when my Immaculate Heart is pierced with sorrows, as Simeon foretold when we presented our Son in the Temple?

Mary kept these things in her Heart, and was guided by the Holy Spirit to fuller understanding. St. Maximilian Kolbe, whom Pope John Paul II called the “Prophet of the civilization of love,” wrote profoundly about Mary’s relationship to the Holy Spirit, whose Spouse she was. He said the Spirit worked through her as his base of operations in the world. Only by the help of that same Holy Spirit, the Spirit of Truth, can we come to understand God’s purposes well enough to submit our wills with cheerful good will.

After her Son, Mary is the greatest example and teacher of this sublime lesson. Mary was physically the Mother of God become Man, but Mary’s greater greatness is that in all things without exception she turned her willpower over to God with gracious faith and loving submission. In all things, her life said, “Be it done unto me according to your word.” This truth is confirmed by Jesus himself. When someone in the crowd praised her for bringing him forth, he said, “Rather, blessed is the one who hears the word of God and keeps it.” Pondering this passage, St. Augustine says that “Mary certainly did the Father’s will, and so it was a greater thing for her to have been Christ’s disciple than to have been his Mother” (Divine Office, Presentation of Mary).

Jesus himself not only preached the word of God, but kept it. To his disciples he said, “My food is to do the will of the one who sent me and to finish his work” (Jn 4:34). In today’s first reading, we learn the deeper meaning of his words. We find the Holy Spirit,Wisdom, telling us that “You will remember me as sweeter than honey, better to have than the honeycomb. He who eats of me will hunger still, he who drinks of me will thirst for more. He who obeys me will not be put to shame; he who serves me will never fail.” To those words, Mary’s whole life as Spouse of the Holy Spirit adds “Amen!”

Mary learned from her Son’s conduct and response that we don’t always grasp God’s ways but we must always adore them and gladly surrender our willpower to them to please him and work with his divine wisdom to advance the work of salvation and the civilization of love. That battle of submission was fought and won by Christ and by Mary. It is the same battle we must fight and win for the glory of God and our eternal glory with him.

From Homilies on The Heart of Jesus and the Apostleship of Prayer by Rev. Herbert F. Smith, S.J.