Today we celebrate the Presentation of the Virgin Mary in the temple. Our knowledge of this event is taken not from the canonical Scriptures, but from an important text, called the “Protoevangelium of James,” written in about the year 150. The Protoevangelium also gives us the names of Mary’s parents, Joachim and Anna. The book is an excellent witness to the importance of the Blessed Virgin in the earliest decades of the Church. We see the earliest Christians reflecting on her role in God’s plan, requiring her to be set apart. Like the prophet Samuel, she is dedicated by her parents to God, to live in the temple and serve the priests who ministered at God’s altar. One of young Mary’s tasks was to weave the temple veil, the veil that would be rent at Jesus’s death.
The Church has always seen in this dedication of the Virgin Mary a foreshadowing of consecrated life. Those called by God to leave the world are to live, like Mary or the apostles after Pentecost, in the temple, praising God at all times. There, we wait upon God’s will, and following the pattern of Mary’s motherhood, we dedicate ourselves to welcoming the life of Christ given at baptism. With the help of God’s grace, we aim to bring that divine life to term by a life of sanctity and purity of heart.
Today we also conclude the monastery’s annual retreat. As it happens, this year’s retreat is shorter than usual, as we are planning to move it back to February. But it has been unusual in many other ways, and perhaps not as quiet and reflective as most of us would have chosen. This might be a reminder from God that no life of sanctity comes without a struggle to accept what is. It might be a reminder that as monks, we can’t afford to use the retreat as a time to “refuel” before we get back to work. We have to be the ones in the Church who say “no” to whatever distracts us from our primary purpose of serving God alone. Is there a difference in kind between withdrawal from the world and retreat? I think that they are both the same thing, differing only in degree. If God has seen to it that we haven’t had as much time for spiritual exercises this week as we would have hoped, this is perhaps a reminder that, for us, spiritual exercises must come first at all times, and not just on retreat.
I don’t want to be too elliptical for our guests: Fr. Edward is doing fine after having surgery on Wednesday night, and while he has a lot of rehab ahead of him, we have reason to expect him back. Other distractions have been more elective, and, as I say, a spur to imitate more fully the example of Our Lady: to put our own plans to the side and say, “Let it be done to me according to your will,” so that we may be a true sign to the Church that God’s will is our peace and not any accomplishment of our own. For whoever does the will of Jesus’s heavenly Father is His brother, sister, and mother, kindred of all the saints in heaven and destined for eternal life.