“Greetings highly favored one, the Lord is with you. . . Blessed are you among women, and blessed is the fruit of your womb.” Luke 1

“From now on all generations shall call me blessed.” Mary’s Magnificat, Luke 1

Did you ever see the movie “Christmas Vacation” starring Chevy Chase as Clark Griswold?  It’s a classic!  In one scene Clark is up in the attic and discovers old 8mm movies from his childhood.  He begins watching them and is immersed in the sweet moments that give way to a sense of melancholy.  That is, until one of his family members opens the attic door, upon which he’s perched, and he falls through.

I had one of those moments this week, not as a result of watching old movies, but simply from recalling past Christmases with my kids.  My mind took me to the Christmas pageants put on in the church, and a conversation I had not long ago with one of my daughters about how disappointed she was that she never got to play the part of Mary.  She was, for whatever reason, always an angel or a shepherd.   Every little girl wanted to play the part of Mary, after all, Mary and the baby Jesus had center stage.

It occurred to me, as I sat in the still silence cogitating about past Christmases, that a curious thing occurred post-Christmas; Mary disappeared!  She would never be mentioned again throughout the course of the year.  It was as if we protestants were practicing our own Assumption of Mary into heaven, and we never saw her again until the next Christmas pageant.

There might be many reasons for having a religious aversion to the blessed Virgin, though I suspect that for Lutherans it was a result of the reaction against anything that smacked of seeming too Catholic.  That is unfortunate because Mary played an essential role not only in the birth of the Savior, but in the faith life of many of His followers as well. 

Thomas Merton summarizes the significant role of Mary far better than I could.  Consider a couple of the following quotes from his book “New Seeds of Contemplation”.

“Mary’s chief glory is in her nothingness, in the fact of being the ‘Handmaid of the Lord’, as one who in becoming the Mother of God acted simply in loving submission to His command, in the pure obedience of faith.  She is blessed not because of some mythical pseudo-divine prerogative, but in all her human and womanly limitations as one who has believed.”

“That God should assume Mary into heaven . . . is a very special manifestation of God’s respect for His creatures, His desire to do honor to the beings He has made in His own image, and most particularly respect for the body, which was destined to be the temple of His glory.  If Mary is believed to be assumed into heave, it is because we too are one day, by the grace of God, to dwell where she is.  If human nature is glorified in her, it is because God desires it to be glorified in us too, and it is for this reason that His Son, taking flesh, came into the world.”

Questions for Contemplation:

What role, if any, might Mary play in our faith life?

How might she help in our quest for a closer connection to the Christ?

What does God dwelling within the body of Mary teach us about God dwelling in our bodies as well?

What does her centrality in the birth story, as well as the life of Jesus, teach us about the importance of women?

And finally, how might we emulate Mary, “play her part” if you will, not merely as part of a Christmas performance but consistently throughout our lives?

Wishing you the best during these Holy Days!