Partners in Prayer

A Reflection on the Feast of the Blessed Virgin Mary 

All Saints’ Church, Southern Shores, NC 

August 16, 2015 

 Thomas E. Wilson, Rector

1 Kings 2:10-12; 3:3-14 Ephesians 5:15-20 Luke 1:46-55

Partners in Prayer

Caravaggio’s Death of the Virgin 1605

Yesterday, August 15^th, in the Episcopal Church Calendar was the Feast of St. Mary the Virgin, and I moved the celebration to today. Thirteen Augusts ago, on August 1, 2003, I came here as your new Rector, and on the third Sunday of that August, I had also wanted to transfer this feast, but the General Convention had just affirmed the election of the first openly gay Bishop in the Episcopal Church and had caused so much controversy that I decided I needed to face that issue instead of dealing with Mary. It took me three years to make the switch, but I need to honor Mary in my own life and in the life of the church as the embodiment of what it means to be a Christian - one who remains open to God’s hopes and dreams. The Gospel story for today reflects Mary’s prayer/song of thanksgiving called the Magnificat. That prayer/song predates Mary by a thousand years with the singing of that Song by Hannah, the mother of Samuel, related in the First Book of Samuel. 

 

Hannah was an old woman who for years had longed for a child, and when finally God had granted her wish, she sang this song in which she, like all parents expecting a child, dreams of their child making the world a better place. Hannah lives in a time when the leaders of the nations and tribes arrogantly exploited the poor and pander to the whims of the rich. Hannah prays/sings that God will give her child the strength to face these obstacles and bring in a time of justice and mercy. The prayer/song is not about what she will get out of this but that she is open to what God can do. She comes with utter openness to be used to bring in God’s Kingdom on earth as it is in heaven. Her son, Samuel, will work to help his nation and he will work to try to influence both King Saul and David to remember that every life is lived in the expectation of being a vessel for God’s loving-kindness.

A hundred years later when David dies, his son Solomon begins his reign as King, and after he finishes dealing with the palace intrigue, he realizes that his Kingdom is not his to own but is part of his stewardship from God to bring about justice and mercy in daily life. His prayer related in the first lesson for today reflects the radical openness to let God use him to bring about God’s Kingdom on earth as it is in heaven.

Nine hundred years later there was a young girl Mary. The title “Virgin” was not a per se acclamation of purity but is the Greek translation of the Hebrew word “Almah”, which meant young girl, into the Greek word “Parthenos” which had the more technical definition of virgin. To be fair, there was an expectation in the Palestinian Jewish community that young girls would be watched over in order to insure virginity at marriage. When Isaiah wrote his prophecy about a “virgin bringing forth a child”, he was speaking about God extraordinarily working with ordinary humans and not about the purity of the particular person. The title meant her utter humanity rather than a pure demi-goddess. It was in the centuries later that the church fixated on sexual purity and on the implication that God used Mary because she was pure. The implication therefore meant that God will only use extraordinarily perfect people. It is my understanding that God uses all kinds of folk to be vessels of God’s loving-kindness. One of the reasons I do a confession of sin almost every week is because I know what I have done or left undone, by action or inaction, and loused up in thought, word and/or deed, and I have the more than sneaking suspicion that I am not the only one in this room that needs to confess. As Mark Twain said that humans are the only mammals that blush, or need to.

One of my favorite paintings is Caravaggio’s Death of the Virgin, housed in the Louvre in Paris. This painting was rejected by the church as unfit because Mary had dirty feet and her stomach is bloated, but I love it because this is a flesh and blood woman not a bloodless plaster saint. The suggestion that the model may have been Caravaggio’s mistress or a prostitute probably did not help.

Mary sings this Song as her prayer of praise that God has chosen her, not because she deserved to be chosen, but because God, in an act of Grace, uses her to be a vessel of God’s loving-kindness to the world. Her son becomes an outward and visible sign of God’s care for all people. This song of commitment is in the same tone as the promises we make when we do baptisms. Today at the 10:30 service we will baptize Oliver Carl Elliott Payne into his ministry of being a vessel of God’s loving-kindness to all the world. We will ask the Holy Spirit to move within him and ask his sponsors and this community to help him live into his calling.

In the broader church in the world there are many who pray using the Rosary as a way of uniting with Mary in her prayer to God, and it is a commitment that we who say the prayer will be like Mary in opening ourselves up to be vessels of God’s Grace, not because we are pure but because we need God’s Holy Spirit to work within us. My Roman Catholic grandmother taught me this way of prayer when I was a child, but it took me getting much older before I started to use it even sporadically.

Let me talk you through what this looks like. The first thing we do is to make the sign of the cross. When I was baptized, the Priest made the sign of the cross on my forehead as a sign that my life was no longer my own but I was claimed as Christ’s own forever. When I make the sign of the cross, it is a reminder that I am part of something much larger than myself, and I claim the name of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit as a shorthand version of trying to describe what I can never fully understand. I am entering into a mystery of faith.

The Sign of the Cross: In the name of the Father of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen  The next thing I do is to recite the Apostle’s Creed which was part of the baptismal service when I was baptized and which we will call the Baptismal Covenant.

The Apostles' Creed: I believe in God the Father Almighty, Creator of heaven and earth; and in Jesus Christ, His only Son, our Lord; Who was conceived by the Holy Ghost, born of the Virgin Mary, suffered under Pontius Pilate, was crucified, died and was buried. He descended into hell. On the third day He arose again; He ascended into heaven, and sitteth at the right hand of God, the Father Almighty; from thence He shall come to judge the living and the dead. I believe in the Holy Ghost, the Holy Catholic Church, the communion of saints, the forgiveness of sins, the resurrection of the body, and life everlasting. Amen The nest step of the Rosary is to say the Lord’s Prayer which is the one that we say Jesus taught us to pray. When we say this prayer, we do not say it alone, we are aware that we are tied into centuries of believers who do this in so many languages. When I was in Jerusalem years ago, I visited the Church of the Pater Nostrum, an unfinished Roman Catholic church, and in its cloister is a series of more than a hundred plaques each showing the Lord’s Prayer in a different language. I love it when I do services with people who say the Prayer in their language while I am saying it in mine, or even in contemporary version, because it is not the words that are important but the spirit which fills the space between, under, over, and through the words that makes a difference between a ritual and an act of faith.

The Our Father: Our Father, who art in heaven, hallowed be Thy name: Thy kingdom come: Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread: and forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us. And lead us not into temptation: but deliver us from evil. Amen. The next step is the Hail Mary which came into devotional use in the 11th or 12th century and became widespread in the 16th. It begins with the words of the Angel who announces to Mary that she will be a vessel of God’s Grace to this broken world. When I say this, I am re-living into that moment of Grace where God’s messengers come and remind me that God does just hang out in heaven someplace above the sky but each moment fills each and every molecule of space in creation and my everyday life. I join with Mary’s Spirit because I believe that life when we die does not end, it only changes. I am not just with Mary, but I am with all the folk who have ever been. Last week I did a prayer for someone who was facing addiction, and I knew that Jack Mann and Jim McDonald, two men who I admired and who have died, were with me in that prayer. I take the name of this church seriously, All Saints, and I know even if I am the only living presence in this building, all of God’s Saints are present. When I am using the rosary as a way of meditation, I will say the Hail Mary slowly ten times to slow my mind down so that I will be reminded that I am not alone.

The Hail Mary: Hail Mary, full of grace, the Lord is with thee: blessed art thou among women, and blessed is the fruit of thy womb, Jesus. Holy Mary, Mother of God, pray for us sinners, now and at the hour of our death. Amen  I end the ten Hail Mary’s, the decade of prayer, with a reminder that I pray not for what I want but for how I might be used by God in this world to the praise of God.

Glory Be to the Father: Glory be to the Father, and to the Son and to the Holy Spirit. As it was in the beginning, is now and ever shall be, world without end. Amen. This prayer is not magic but it can be helpful for some people to go deeper. I invite you to say it slowly with me if you wish - All may, some should, none must.

Partners in Prayer

Hail Mary, full of grace, the Lord is with thee:

blessed art thou among women, and

blessed is the fruit of thy womb, Jesus.

Holy Mary, Mother of God, pray for us sinners,

now and at the hour of our death. Amen

Hail Jack, full of grace, the Lord is with thee;

blessed art thou among men and

blessed is the fruit of your outreach, Christ

dwelling in the space between us and the poor

Hail Jim, full of grace, the Lord is with thee:

blessed art thou among men and

blessed is the fruit of your care, the Holy Spirit

strengthening the recovery of addicts.

Hail Lillian, full of grace, the Lord is with thee;

blessed art thou among women of song and

blessed is the fruit of your love of music

singing “plummet sounding heav'n and earth”.

Caravaggio had it right with the Virgin’s death

she of dirty feet and passionate intensity

showing the fullness of God in the ordinary

incarnating love given gracefully.

Holy Jack, Jim, Lillian and all my soul friends, and

all who have lived as brothers and sisters of Jesus

pray with this sinner now and in the hour of my death