The Immaculate Heart of the Virgin Mary

Funny, I should post on the Immaculate  Heart of Mary but not the Sacred Heart of Jesus!   Anyway, in Luke we read the story of Joseph and Mary returning to Jerusalem after Passover to look for the missing Jesus.  They find him with the teachers.  When they approach him he tells Mary and Joseph   “Why were you looking for me?  Did you not know I must be in my Father’s house?” (Lk. 4:49 NAB)

Luke tells us that Joseph and Mary “did not understand what he said to them,” but that Mary held these things in her heart.  Parents who have struggled with their children will get this.  When our children’s hidden disabilities emerge, or when they are severely injured, or perhaps get addicted to drugs or alcohol, or at the very  worst, die, we hold these things in our hearts and struggle with them.  We struggle with our purpose, we struggle with life, and we struggle with God.  It is at times like these that theological explanations often fall short.  It is in times like these that our pure faith…our pure love and trust in God, the God who loves us…is what will cause us to both carry on and carry through what life has dealt us.   Mary, our example of the pure loving response to the loving Father, shows us exactly this response in this story.  We do not know, we do not understand, yet we respond with love. 

I joked a bit about not posting yesterday.  However, I did have a homily for the day, and I pointed out that the heart is our symbol of love, from heart-shaped candy boxes to the “I Heart…” bumper stickers.   The heart represents love.  The Sacred Heart is the ultimate representation of the ultimate love, the complete and total love the Father has for us that we see in Christ on the Cross and Christ Risen.   Today, we see the human response, the love of the human heart from the one whose Immaculate Heart  shows us more than any other what it means to respond to the Sacred Love we are given.

I don't know much about Barnabas except that he probably got up each morning and went out and did what Christ called him to do.  He probably lived somewhat like how we try.  Get up, pray, go about spreading the Gospel in the way we live, have days that go wonderfully, have days that go horribly, pray some more, wonder what it's all about, break Bread, get some sleep and do it again in the morning.  In short a life that our popular culture finds dull, unexciting and maybe downright scary.   He doesn't sound like someone who had an agenda, carried a grudge, or was so full of himself that he thought he knew it all.  Actually, he sounds humble.  Humble as in my life is for God, not for me. Humble as maybe we really want to be,