The mother
of the Prince of Peace is speaking some pretty revolutionary words in our
Gospel tonight. That often gets glossed over when we hear Mary spoken of as the
woman who says, “Here am I, the servant of the Lord; let it be with me
according to your word.” But I’d like to remind us tonight just how radical and
rebellious living from out of the peace of God actually is.
I’m really
not sure where the idea of Mary being meek and mild came from. I understand its
usefulness from a certain point of view. The meek and mild myth is certainly
emphasized by patriarchal & misogynistic systems, because it’s dangerous to
have a female role model as feisty as Mary actually is.
And she’s
not just feisty in the political diatribe we call the Magnificat. She’s just as
strong headed in the story about the wedding at Cana. Mary doesn’t even listen
to Jesus but just orders the wine steward to talk to Jesus in that motherly way
of assuming her child will do what she wants.
Mary is the
servant of the Lord. But subservience and submission to God should not be
confused with subservience and submission to another human being – no matter
what Paul might have said. I mean, I really don’t think Mary saying yes to
Gabriel without first consulting her husband fits the common interpretation of
Paul’s words in Ephesians. It seems both liberal and conservative interpret
Paul’s words this way they just have different relationships to it.
Mary has a
strong sense of self. The Magnificat echoes Hannah’s song, so here is Mary identifying
herself with a figure from Scripture. This is hardly a meek or mild thing to
do. It would seem in the eyes of her culture even more audacious than Jesus
claiming he is the fulfillment of Isaiah’s prophecy when He begins His
ministry.
It’s also
important to note that Mary speaks of what God HAS done, not what God will
shortly do. God has chosen the lowest of the low in the furthest reaches of the
Global Empire to bring about the incarnation. God has already scattered the
proud, brought down the powerful and lifted up the lowly in choosing a Nazorean
woman to bear the incarnation. The hungry are filled with God’s very self!
To put
Jesus’ human origin in relationship to Rome in a modern context; Just imagine
some Chamorro kid from Guam showing up in Washington DC with a horde of
poverty-stricken, quasi-legal followers proclaiming himself the messiah, or on
an equal level to God. That would be well received, don’t you think?
The analogy
would be more accurate to say Jesus showed up in Honolulu, because Jesus never
went to Rome, but you get my point I think. Not meek, not mild, rather humble
of origin and gentle in His power.
In fact the
English word meek, which we do read as one of the blessed qualities in the
Beatitudes, doesn’t have the same meaning as the original Greek. The Greek word
indicates gentleness in how one uses their strength. The Greek does not imply
weakness as the English does.
Meek and
mild as subservient to the status quo is a complete misunderstanding of what
peace actually is. To live a truly peaceful life is genuinely counter cultural.
It flies in the face of a violent culture that solves its problems with
violence.
Our culture
of violence is the modern version of the sin offerings the author of Hebrews
speaks of – though these sacrifices are made so we can go on sinning. Violence is a
scapegoat offering on the altars of revenge, racism, sexism, xenophobia, etc. and
the scapegoats ARE the people who are being sinned against… or the people who
stand up for them.
It is the
prince of peace who offered His body in order to abolish this. Living the life
of peace God asks of us is not meek, nor mild. And it will not be well
received. Gandhi, Martin Luther King, the Mississippi civil rights workers, St.
Steven, all the apostles except John, and more were crucified. This is the harsh
truth of living out of peace and love.
The harsh
truth of how the world receives peace, though, is not what ultimately concerns
us. A greater reality, a greater Kingdom is available to us. This is the
Kingdom that is both/and; both breaking in and yet to come. It is from this
reality that we find the strength of God. We are heirs to that strength, a
strength that must be wielded gently, without exploiting power, wealth or
status. Power, wealth and Status are not God’s will for us. That’s what one
makes sin sacrifices for.
Mary
understood this, this is what she is saying, not that Rome will fall, but that
God has made Rome irrelevant. Empire is the antithesis of the Kingdom of
Heaven. For the one true King of all will soon be born in the most humble of
circumstances. And He is the one we follow. “For now he shall be great to the
ends of the earth; and he shall be the one of peace.”
Readings:
Micah 5:2-5a
Psalm 80:1-7
Hebrews
10:5-10
Luke 1:39-55
