The gift of Jesus's Mother on Good Friday

I am reminded via an email from Catholic U’s Institute for Human Ecology (seriously, they always send really well-written and thoughtful emails, and I think I’ve only ever attended one of their talks, yet I have not unsubscribed) that Good Friday is the day that Jesus really gifted us his Mother, Mary. Is it that she was always humanity’s Mother, as soon as she conceived? I guess so. But it is in his telling us so that it becomes fact, real, alive.

John 19:25-27:

Standing by the cross of Jesus were his mother and his mother’s sister, Mary the wife of Clopas, and Mary of Magdala.

When Jesus saw his mother and the disciple there whom he loved, he said to his mother, “Woman, behold, your son.”

Then he said to the disciple, “Behold, your mother.” And from that hour the disciple took her into his home.

I have always had a strong Marian devotion - that’s just the way it is. But, I know that others struggle there, to see her role in God’s plan and to understand why she matters.

But if you do struggle: look to Jesus’s own words here. As I talked about earlier this week on Morning Air, Mary gives us a wealth of ways, this week in particular, to learn how to be a disciple with Jesus. She is our Mother, and also our example. She is perfect, but not unrelatable. She is a queen, but not out of reach. And her motherhood extends beyond her very real role as Christ-bearer, to all aspects of our spiritual lives: she is the Mother of Divine Grace, Mother of Good Counsel, Mother of Perpetual Help, Seat of Wisdom, Queen of Peace. If you turn over parts of your life to her, see how she addresses them for the better, or multiplies them for your good. It’s just how it works.

It being Good Friday, today is a day of solemnity, and so I stay in that existence today. Fasting, yes, and of course, watching The Passion of the Christ, as you do. I know that I don’t “get” Good Friday or have a “successful” or “good” one of my own doing. That, like so much else, is a matter of God’s own grace. So, that is my prayer - that I would be open to the grace of what I need to learn, understand, see, and experience, in these last moments before the Resurrection. How good is the faith, that we get to have this strange and powerful time - that He trusted us with it, because He cares that much about us. How good indeed!