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March 25, 2022Recently, someone asked me why some Catholics put the statue of Mary in a bathtub on their front lawns? This person asked, “Why is this an American tradition and she went on to ask if this is how some domesticate the importance of Mary?” I responded, “To enshrine the Blessed Virgin Mary is not an American tradition, just walk down any street in Rome, there are paintings and icons of the Virgin on most street corners. But, the bathtub… that is American.” For Catholic Christians, Mary has always been celebrated for her role in salvation history. Our solemnity today is one such example. As the Angel Gabriel ‘announces’ God’s plan to this teenage Jewess and waits for her answer, Gabriel des not encounter the version of Mary often depicted in medieval art, someone sitting around as if loitering. No, Mary was not a weak, shy, retiring, housebound lady. God’s invitation would most likely have come amidst cooking, cleaning, bringing in firewood, carrying water from the public well, to her extended family’s home. The invitation to be the Christ-bearer would have come while doing the family chores. As we know from the gospels, Mary would be tough enough to travel by foot and donkey during pregnancy through rough northern hill terrain to visit Elizabeth and later, more traveling, with Joseph, to Bethlehem in the south.
In the midst of daily routine, the Holy Spirit of God invites Mary, in some mysterious way to bear Jesus, the savior of the world. Mary’s strength of body is matched only by her sense of logic and inquisitiveness as she engages God actively with her questions, “How can this be…” (LK 1:34). After hearing the answer, Mary responds to the invitation with her whole being, “Yes!”
What about us? Are we too called to be “Christ bearers?” Absolutely, The Holy Spirit still comes to ordinary people, not only on Sundays surrounded by stained glass but every day when we are right in the middle of life, in the daily grind, in the joys and in the sorrows of what enfolds for us. There, after our encounter with the Holy, God invites us to act. Don’t domesticate the call. Don’t turn it off or let it go to voicemail. Why? Because, as he did with Mary, God lovingly waits for our courageous “Yes” to bring Christ to the world in our words and deeds.
