Mary, the mother of God, is upheld as a paragon of virtue. Across denominations, Christians ask for her prayers, honor her sacrifice, and encourage her emulation. We are asked to be like her, and yet the task seems impossible. A mother whose virtue risked malignment from her own community, she raised the child she was blessed with only to watch him die a horrible death for others.
She stands with the other women in our readings as one to whom we are less comfortable relating than we are awing in. Renderings of her often do not ask us to meet her eyes: she stares down benignly, or clasps the boy Jesus in her arms, or cradles the crucified son; she calmly gazes at her bleeding heart.
It is easy to understand why some have worried that the adoration of Mary moves toward deification; such virtue seems to transcend our humanity. In her shoes, would we not be resentful? Would we rage against God, refusing to hand our children over, refusing to stand demurely by while others presume things of us which cannot be borne out?
And yet Mary discusses her pregnancy with Elizabeth, herself carrying John the Baptist, as a blessing. She bravely walks into a future we might call unhappy, fully willing to be the mother of the boy Jesus, destined to die on our behalf.
She calls this a blessing, not a curse. In general selfishness, I sometimes think I could not do the same. I am sometimes happy not to have to meet her eyes, when the blessings I crave would bring happiness without the later dismay.
The women in our readings for the week all bring the parameters of “blessed” into such perspective. Their names, and the names of their children, are among the most evoked in human history. Yet for all of their notoriety, they far from had it easy.
In the second chapter of 1 Samuel, we encounter Hannah at a complicated moment in her life. After coming through the grief of being apparently barren, and having God answer her prayers by blessing her with a son, Hannah is compelled to fulfill her promise to God by delivering her son to the priest Eli, his own life now dedicated to priestly service.
Hannah loved Samuel dearly; he was the fulfillment of her most cherished hopes. Even his name evokes the fact that Hannah appealed to God for him. And still she’s hardly able to know her son before she must give him up.
Quite conceivably, Hannah could be prompted to grieve, or even to “forget” her promise, clinging to her son. The sacrifice she had promised to make seems of the sort that can overwhelm. And yet our passage is a prayer of thanksgiving, empty of mourning or regret.
Hannah does not rage against God for giving and then taking away. Instead, she exalts God. Though undoubtedly heart-rent, she expounds upon the gifts of heaven.
She rejoices that heartbreak can be reversed—that the hungry are eventually sated by God, that through the Divine, the barren bear children and the poor are brought to honor (1 Samuel 2:5, 8).
Hannah’s prayer concentrates on the fluidity of our situations. What pains us most is blessedly finite, thanks to God; if the unjust exist in comfort and enjoy apparent ease, Hannah knows that that, too, can be reversed.
Hannah is thus able to dedicate her most beloved son to God as she promised; her awe soothes the pain of separation, her gratitude outweighs the coming loneliness.
The prayer of the second chapter of 1 Samuel compels us to transcend our angst over moments of tribulation, as well as our doubt; it insists on lifting up news of God’s greatness, even in times when we’d rather concentrate on the ways in which we are tried.
From Hannah’s story we move into Romans 12, which also insists that all be steadfast in faith, regardless of transitory conditions. We are enjoined to love with sincerity, to trust in God without wavering and to be sympathetic to one another, in recognition of God’s equal love for each of us.
Romans doesn’t promise continual sunshine or otherwise perfect days. In fact, it takes troubled times for granted: weeping, suffering and persecution are all anticipated. To be loved by God is not to escape hardship; loving God isn’t fed by the evasion of difficulties.
In the first chapter of Luke, we meet both Elizabeth and Mary during their respective pregnancies. Mary is weathering slight scandal as she visits her aunt; though betrothed, her pregnancy had raised eyebrows.
Nor had Elizabeth, married for many years and perpetually childless, been expected to be a mother. Her pregnancy recalls Hannah’s: she, too, had thought herself barren; she, too, experienced late motherhood as a blessing.
She, too, would ultimately be asked to dedicate her son’s life to God. Mary, too, would have to relinquish her beloved son to God’s ultimate cause. Motherhood required much of these women.
Yet Mary says “my soul magnifies YHWH, and my heart rejoices in God my savior” (Luke 1:46-47). Her impulse is to praise God, not to snipe over coming hardships. She regards her child as a fulfillment, and as part of God’s great history of reversing misfortune: God has shown strength, has fed the hungry, has made Israel great.
Hannah, Mary and Elizabeth become the mothers of our faith. Their children each furthered God’s work on Earth, each made great sacrifices to bring the words and goodness of the Divine to fruition.
The humility and grace of the women who gave them life stand as examples for us. From those to whom much is given, so much is required: God’s conditionless love empowers us to love selflessly and without condition. There is a mystery to this which we cannot always unravel.
Understandably, we often stand uncomfortably before figures like Hannah, Elizabeth, and Mary. The great challenge of our faith, however, is that it compels us to join in on their prayers, to confront the possibility of giving praise when the reverse seems more natural. Loving God, in thanks for God’s love, purifies us of our worst impulses; it removes the sting of our pains. Or it can.
Our scriptures assure us that it will.
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