Mass 6th Day within Christmas of the Nativity of the Lord.

Father Marie-Domenique Philippe O.P. (+2006) 

Monday 30th December 2013.

MAGNIFICAT com. 

Gospel, Luke 2:36-40.

‘She spoke of the child to all who looked forward to the deliverance of Jerusalem’.

MEDITATION OF THE DAY

Anna and Mary

A widow of "great age" who "did not depart from the Temple, worshipping with fasting and prayer night and day" (Lk 2:37), moved by the Holy Spirit, begins to give glory to God and to speak of the Child Jesus "to all who were looking for the redemption of Jerusalem". Before John the Baptist, who will be "the voice of one crying in the wilderness" to announce the coming of the Messiah, after the angels who glorified God in the highest, there is this poor widow in the Temple, who is the first to announce the good news. This prophetess of the tribe of Asher is there as the representative of all the other prophetesses of the Old Testament who bore witness to God's merciful providence.

The mystery of the Presentation really brings together in the Temple all that was living and true in the Old Testament. The Holy Spirit brings them together in God's house so that they may be able to receive this first visit of Christ to the Temple to share in his mystery by recognising that the period of expectation has finally ended and that the Light appears and begins to rise.

This mystery shows us how the union of the Old and the New Testaments is found in Mary, how in and through her the Old Testament is assumed by the New without being abolished: the Old Testament is completely transformed. She is the woman who closes and completes the Synagogue and the woman who is the Mother and prototype of the Church.

This union is achieved through the mystery of the cross, but Mary must first live this mystery in her faith, her hope, and her love. This mystery must take complete possession of her soul before being accomplished out­wardly in Christ's body. She must carry it in the inmost depths of her heart, and this is truly what constitutes this mystery of offering and purification, which is actually one and the same mystery. For every offering brings about a purification, and every divine purification must be an offering.

Father Marie-Domenique Philippe O.P. (+2006) a Dominican priest was the founder of the Community of 5t John and taught philosophy and theology.