Editor’s note: The following entry is the final of four that considers the Blessed Virgin Mary’s relationship to the liturgy and sacraments. These insights are given by Dominican Father Jean Corbon, who is best known for his significant contributions to the Catechism of the Catholic Church on the topic of prayer. His presentation was given in 1994 at the Institute of Liturgy of the University of the Holy Spirit in Kalik (Lebanon). See part one here, part two, here, and part three here.
2. The Holy Mother of God in Christian Life
The preceding reflections have at times made reference to what I would have to assume is in our lives, the role of the Théotokos in the sacramental Economy. By way of conclusion, it will be enough for us to remember the essential thread that unites the celebration and life, then bring out two of its most important implications.
The sacramental liturgy is the privileged and indispensable place of our participation in the Economy of the mystery of Christ. Whichever may be its form, but especially in the Eucharist, it carries an aspect of Memorial, but we must understand well: we do not evoke a memory, but rather the Holy Spirit reminds us that the Event celebrated really happened in history and remains in it acting today. In this way, the sacrament announces the Event of the mystery of Christ and communicates to us the experience of what is announced. Our celebrations (téleiôsis) do not repeat the Event, but make it penetrate more profoundly in us, because it is in us that something is lacking in the suffering of Christ on behalf of his Body which is the Church (cf. Colossians 2:24). Everything is already completed by Christ, but not yet in all or completely in each one. The liturgy celebrated tends toward the liturgy lived. From this point of view, what does this imply for us, in our relation to the Holy Mother of God?
The first vital implication for us proceeds from what is presupposed in the divine maternity of Mary: the virginal mystery of her being that fully adapts to the power of the Holy Spirit’s love. It is the deep humility of the humble servant, her acceptance of powerlessness, that makes possible for God that which is impossible for man. However, the Church, of which we form a part, is essentially virgin by vocation. “There is one Virgin Mother and I am happy to call her the Church,” Clement of Alexandria tells us.1 The fertility of the mission of the Church is in this condition. Because she is Virgin, like Mary, the Church is Bride and Mother. Each time that the Church relies on the powers of this world, those of influence, money, or appearances, she prostitutes herself and returns barren. This gift of ecclesial virginity calls her without ceasing to a combat, to a conversion, to a return to her first love (cf. Revelation 2-3).
The second implication for us follows from the same mystery of Mary as “Mother of God.” We saw it when meditating on the hidden harmony between the Annunciation, the Cross, the tomb, and the Resurrection. We turned to encounter it in the Eucharist as Offering, especially in the epiclesis and the intercession. In this, once again, the Church is called to live that which is at the root of this mystery: Mary offers to the Son of God the flesh of our common humanity. It is necessary that this flesh be assumed by him, so that it may be rescued, saved, transfigured. The maternal mission of the Church, before doing this or that, consists of participating in this flesh of humanity, for whose salvation she has been sent. To be with men, without exclusion, to be for them, and not for herself, this is the vital implication for the Church of the mystery of the Théotokos. Then, her intercession may ceaselessly offer to the Father this humanity with hope or love. The deepest being of the Church, of which we form a part, is found in this epiclesis of faith over the world, “in communion with Our Lady, the all-Holy Mother of God and Ever-Virgin Mary.”
For previous installments of Father Corbon’s reflections on Mary’s role in the Sacramental Economy, see:
About this piece:
Jean Corbon “Sainte Marie Mère de Dieu dans l’économie sacramentelle et dans la vie chrétienne:” Proche-Oriente Chrétien 45 (1995) 10-25. Conference given in the Institute of Liturgy of the University of the Holy Spirit in Kalik (Lebanon), March 14, 1994, in the liturgical conferences organized each year since 1985 by the Institute. The Arabic text is included in the ninth series of the liturgical conferences. Translated by Lucy Schemel from the Spanish as printed in Liturgia y Oracion, Jean Corbon, Ediciones Cristiandad S.A, Madrid, 2004, pp. 91-115.
Image Source: AB/Lawrence OP on Flickr. Mural from the church of the Visitation in Ein Kerem, near Jerusalem.
