SimonMary Asese Aihiokhai
Today, June 8th, 2024, the Catholic Church celebrates the Memorial of the Immaculate Heart of Mary. Interestingly, the Gospel reading focuses on what I would prefer to tag as the Jesus drama at the Temple in Jerusalem. Having been lost for over three days and with frantic mother and father going around town with great desperation looking for their child, when they find him, Jesus gives them what would be considered an arrogant response. Yet, it is not. It is arrogant for those who may not know the hidden truths of the mission of Jesus. But for Mary, Jesus knew exactly that his mother knows his mission and all that he is about. The passage ends with the following words about Mary: “And his mother kept all these things in her heart (Luke 2:51).
One may wonder why such an event ends with such words, and what link do they have with what the Church chooses to celebrate today? When one takes time to read through the gospels carefully and do an analytical hermeneutics on the personality of Mary, one notices something wonderful and yet mysterious about her. Mary embodies what the ancient stoics would refer to as an embodiment of epoche – suspension of judgment. For the stoics, to rush to judgment is to become blind to the wonders and complexities that present themselves through that which is being encountered. To avoid this, one has to learn the virtue of patience and to resist a leap to moralization of that which is being encountered.
From the encounter with Angel Gabriel down to the resurrection of Jesus, Mary embodied the ritualization of the virtue of suspension of judgment and a turn to radical encounter without a leap to making conclusions. This virtue was what was lacking in Peter during the encounter with the Transfiguration. As soon as Peter made a judgement statement, the apparition ended immediately. Also, when Jesus invited Peter to come to him as Jesus walked on the water, Peter made a judgment statement and ended up almost drowning. Jesus had to stretch his hand to him to rescue Peter.
The Memorial of the immaculate Heart of Mary is not simply about the sermonization of a call to purity. We all know that Mary is a symbol of the gift of purity. But this memorial evokes in the consciousness of the Church a call to take seriously the Christian calling to always learn to suspend judgment about others, especially when the judgment will end up diminishing the reputation or life of the one being judged. Too often, Christians, without exception, embody a type of moral deficiency which is conditioned to want to embrace a moral hierarchy of we are better than others. This temptation is most present among ordained men and women or religious leaders. It is the temptation of religious righteousness. Even I who is writing these lines, I am guilty as charged. We see the world through a prism of bias. We make our vision the normative one, and anyone who falls short of our vision, we quickly condemn. We forget that the other is always an infinite gift and embodiment of complexities. The greatest temptation we must all resist is to want to ‘fix’ those we think we need to save. This is how we become the agents of the devil in people’s lives and prevent the Holy Spirit from encountering such persons in a manner that God desires best for them.
To embody the heart of Mary is to learn to practice a way of being in the world where we allow God to encounter others in and through their own agencies. We show up for them while always creating the space for them to walk on their own feet. This was what Mary did after she found her lost child. She gave him the needed space for him to grow. When he needed her, she was present. But she was never overbearing as most parents are tempted to do.
The heart of Mary can teach our world something that we all need. We live in a world today where the pandemic of ‘fixing’ others reigns supreme. The powerful nations want to fix the so-called weaker nations. They go there and legitimize their greed and virus of exploitation all in the name of fixing. Persons with influence want to ‘fix’ those they believe to be beneath them. They end up cloning and even traumatizing them through their own colonial biases that are intended to perpetuate their own comfort. What the world needs today is a culture of epoche.
The culture of epoche demands that humanity learns again how to encounter without judgment. No one is without fault. No one is without vices. No one is without inconsistencies. Keeping this anthropological truth in mind can help humanity to be kind to itself. A world where epoche reigns supreme will be a world where true healing can occur for all in need of it. It is a world where authentic understanding will reign supreme. It is a world where the words of Jesus to the woman caught in adultery will be validated – Jesus chose to suspend judgment on her and allow her to regain her rightful dignity as a human being and as a woman.
The words of the lukan account in today’s reading is a reminder that the human heart is not meant to be a judging machine. Rather, it is meant to understand, love unconditionally, forgive, rejoice, welcome, and encounter all who are in proximity to it. The heart of Mary is a heart that understands. It is a heart that forgives. It is a heart that loves. It is a heart that weeps. It is a heart that hopes for the good of all.
May the heart of Mary soften our human hearts so that we can end all useless wars in our world. Mary’s heart invites our world to show kindness to those who are poor, those who are houseless, those who are orphans, and those who are sick. Only when they become whole can our world be truly a healthy world.
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