NATIVITY OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY 2021
Mi 5: 1-4
Rm 8: 28-30
Mt 1: 1-23
It must be very clear that we do love St Joseph. We pray to him every day and we are full of gratitude to the Holy Father Pope Francis who has given us this present year as a ‘Year of St Joseph’. This is a marvellous opportunity to get closer to St Joseph who is so important in the life of Jesus and the Church.
It must be very clear, too, that we find St Joseph’s ancestry absolutely fascinating. St Matthew gave it pride of place at the beginning of his gospel. Forty two fathers and four mothers take place in a solemn procession. They come in three groups: one ‘from Abraham to David’, one ‘from David to the deportation to Babylon’, and one ‘from the deportation to Babylon to the Christ’. We admire the harmonious series of fourteen generations which follow one another with the regularity of a musical pattern. You find great and famous names, and others which are totally unknown. St Matthew, though, seems more interested in the sheer continuity of the generations. There is in their succession something of a mystery. This is not only the ancestry of this one man Joseph. Something much broader and more universal is at stake. These men and women are the ancestors of Christ and, in a sense, they rather ascend towards Him – as we all try to do – than He descends from them.
All this is very interesting, but it does not quite solve the question we cannot avoid each year when we hear this Gospel on the day of the Birthday of Our Lady. Why should Joseph’s ancestors be mentioned when we celebrate Mary’s Birthday? Should not we rather hear of St Anne and St Joachim, and their ancestry?
This is, of course, a question we might wish to put to St Joseph himself. But there is not much to be expected on that side. St Joseph, as you know, is not someone who likes to speak. Not a single word from him has been kept. He is not good at words. He likes silence, and, after all, it is probably fitting that the one who acted as a father towards the Word made flesh would be a man of silence. In this way, he represents fittingly the eternal Father who, according to St Ignatius of Antioch, begets the Word in silence.
That is why we have to turn to Mary herself. Of course, she is still a very young baby, but if we, too, keep silence, we shall soon be able to perceive the music of her soul. The harmonies of the generations seem to echo the pulsation of her inner being. The same divine Composer who created the harmonious mathematics of the celestial spheres, and disposed with an elegant rhythm the generations of Christ’s ancestors, also attuned the soul of the Immaculate according to the supreme musicality of His eternal grace, love and mercy.
St Matthew with his fine musical ear has perceived these harmonies of the Divine Plan of God, the perfect melody of the divine symphony through the ages of the history of salvation which culminates in the perfect chord of the Holy Family: Joseph, the silence, Mary, the music, lovingly caring for Jesus, the Word of God.
St Luke has given it its poetic and liturgical expression in the words of the Magnificat: “Henceforth all generations will call me blessed; for He who is mighty has done great things for me and holy is His name.” Here they are, the ‘generations’: those who came before, and those who follow after; the great and the good, and all the obscure and forgotten ones. Mary, too, is a summit to which generations ascend as they echo her hymn of praise. Mary sings with her musical soul, and she remains in the Church a powerful invitation for all generations to sing the praise of Christ, her divine Son.
Mary is a pure note in a world out of tune. The generations can attune themselves to her holiness. It has even become a traditional tool of sanctification in Christian life: attune yourself to Mary and your soul – and your life – will keep the pitch. Remain close to Mary and you will easily follow the guidance of the Holy Spirit, the perfect Conductor who will introduce you into the whole Truth of Christ. You will discover, under the guidance of the Holy Spirit and Mary, the score of infinite beauty which is the Word of God. Mary is always singing from this score. Her whole life is a perfect performance of Christ’s melody. From the day of her birth, and indeed of her conception, she sings the hymn of salvation and leads the whole world into the praise of the Saviour.
This is, of course, a very quiet music – one could say: a silent music – here, by the way, we see why it could win over the silent Joseph. Mary’s musical soul is bathed in the great silence of the Father, who is the ultimate Author of the generations, the Begetter of the Word. May I suggest this music of Mary’s soul is something like the Chant of the Church, what we call the Gregorian Chant? Its secret consists in a great simplicity, the power of a few words well chosen, and the supreme balance and peace of its melodies.
It is time now to go back to the silent Joseph. The waves of the generations who lead to Christ reach with him the threshold of God. No human ancestry can of itself beget God in the flesh; it can only open itself up to God’s gift. This gift is Jesus, the Son of God. But it first takes the shape of a little girl whose birth fills the world with infinite hope. It is this birth which we honour today in our peaceful and musical liturgy – and with the silent music of our loving souls.