Welcoming Grace

(16th Sunday in Ordinary Time, C)

The short passage from the Gospel of Luke that we have today, that of Martha, stressed out with much serving, and her sister Mary, listening quietly to the Lord, has a long history of comment and interpretation...

However, for a summer Sunday, perhaps just a few little points are good enough … and the Church, as a tender mother, helps us in this, giving us a key to interpretation in the first reading, that of welcome and hospitality.

(As we know, for the Sundays in Ordinary Time, the first reading and the gospel go together, while the second reading has its own cycle.)

In fact, in the first reading today, we have one of the great moments of the Old Testament, the announcement of the birth of Isaac. And we see how the grace of this announcement is preceded by a scene that shows us how Abraham and Sarah welcomed the presence of God that appeared to them as three mysterious men. Abraham and Sarah welcomed the presence of God in a very concrete way; pointing out a place in which the presence of God could rest comfortably and then preparing a meal.

In the gospel, we see how Martha and Mary welcome the presence of God, and the presence of God par excellence, the person of Jesus. And they do this in two ways, Martha in her service of hospitality, and Mary, who sat beside the Lord at his feet listening to him speak.

And notwithstanding the words of Jesus to Martha when she expresses herself in her stress – that only one thing is necessary – that is, to welcome to the grace of God, her service is important, indeed necessary.

Many of you have lived the grace of the sacrament of matrimony, which is the center of the family, and we do well to remember now and then that before there was original sin, there was original blessing, and that blessing includes our being and living as families. As we pray in the blessing of the spouses at the end of a wedding, marriage is the one grace that was not forfeited by original sin nor washed away by the flood.

Now families come in all shapes and sizes, but as we know, it takes work to welcome God by welcoming his grace of the blessing of living as a family. It demands service, both the internal work of the virtues like patience and understanding, as well as everything that goes into meals, housework, and all the rest. And even if it happens sometimes, like with Martha, in the work of much care someone feels overburdened, the Lord reminds us that all of that effort contributes to the one thing that is necessary, that is, to welcome the grace of God.

In this sense, we can also see more clearly the value of Mary’s place, which the Lord calls the better part. As all of work and effort of sharing our lives with one another is necessary for the one task of welcoming the presence of God, contemplation has its own place too. For each of us, in whatever state of life we are in before God, we need moments in which we can stop and enjoy the better part, contemplation.

There’s an ancient Christian description of the human being as a capax dei, a being capable of receiving God, of welcoming the divine presence. And all of us, in this vocation, we are sometimes Martha and sometimes Mary. In our example of the life of grace that is being a family – and in this sense we can speak also of the parish family or a religious community – there are moments in which welcoming the presence of God means concrete service, and there are other moments in which it is fitting to sit beside the Lord at his feet, that is, in prayer and contemplation.

It can happen that the stages of a life unfold in the movement between these two positions. When we have all the strength of youth, perhaps our life is more like Martha. Then the years accumulate – as well as wisdom – and there grows in us the desire for that true calm of contemplation that is being quiet in the presence of the Lord.