Brothers and sisters, we come together this evening to complete the gift of ourselves through the consecration of our Parishes and ourselves to Jesus through Mary. As we do this, we encounter this “woman clothed with the sun with the moon under her feet, and on her head a crown of twelve stars.” The description of Our Lady in the Book of Revelation reminds us of her motherly role in the life of not only Jesus but of the Church. This same Mary is the one who goes to the hill country in haste to a town of Judah, where she entered the house of Zechariah and greeted Elizabeth. Filled with the Holy Spirit, and bearing the Son of God in her immaculate womb, Mary shares the good news of salvation with her kinswoman and with the world. She is, in fact, the first evangelist!
That same woman who visited Elizabeth is the very Virgin who appeared to Juan Diego at Tepeyac – a woman surrounded by the rays of the sun, clothed in a mantle of stars, and even bearing a child in her womb. This Woman – Our Lady of Guadalupe – promised to accompany and strengthen the humble Juan Diego in his own vocation, and through his announcement of her will, the entire nation of the Aztecs in Mexico was converted and came to Jesus Christ. This illustrates something that Pope St. John Paul II once wrote to the Church in America, that “Mary is the sure path to our meeting with Christ. Devotion to the Mother of the Lord, when it is genuine, is always an impetus to a life guided by the spirit and values of the Gospel” (Ecclesia in America, 11).
This is the same Virgin Mary whom we invoke upon our Pastorate this evening, asking for her motherly care and intercession. The act of consecrating ourselves to Jesus through Mary “means giving Mary our full permission … to complete her motherly task in us, which is to form us into other Christs” (33 Days to Morning Glory, p 26) By doing this, we are seeking to be saints, conformed to the sacred hearts of Jesus and Mary.
For us in this particular Pastorate, I think Our Lady of Guadalupe is an ideal Patroness to bring us together and orient us for our evangelical mission. First, Mary is the woman who constantly goes out to share her Son with the world. Beginning with Elizabeth, she is a model for evangelization. Second, this is the same Mary who called St. Bernadette of Lourdes to her special vocation of revealing God’s love for the poor and His will to heal us. Third, as “Empress of the Americas,” Mary is the perfect companion to Christ the King of the Universe. And finally, Mary is “Our” Lady, gathering us into the one family of the Church that is the Body of her beloved Son Jesus.
May our gift of ourselves this evening be received by her and handed over to her Son and Lord, so we can be filled with the Holy Spirit’s gifts and empowered to be a light in our community for many years to come.
Comments