4th Sunday of Easter – 2025
Fr. Peter Robinson
Preached: May 11, 2025
* Sunday Missal: 60, Eucharistic Prayer for Reconciliation II
- As we celebrate Mother’s Day this weekend, our thoughts turn naturally to Mary, our spiritual Mother
- We can rightly call her the “mother of all mothers”
- So, let me share a few thoughts with you about Mother Mary …
- 1st, it was in Mary’s womb that God became one of us
- But who is this God?
- William Lane Craig is a leading Christian philosopher and debater
- When debating with atheists, his technical description of God is this:
- God is an infinite and personal being of maximal greatness
- God is pure actuality (he “is”), he is unchanging, and he is not composed of metaphysical parts
- He is, therefore, the ground of being itself
- Now, consider that God
- Dwelling within the darkness and the confines of Mary’s womb — for 9 months
- All the while (as the unborn Jesus), he is utterly dependent on Mary for every aspect of his human life
- Thanks to Google, here is a description of a prenatal baby within its mother’s body:
- It has its own space capsule (amniotic sac)
- It has its own lifeline (umbilical cord)
- And it has its own root system (placenta) while in the womb
- In fact, scientists have discovered a phenomena known as “prenatal memory”
- When unborn babies at 30-37 weeks of pregnancy were played (regularly) a certain TV theme song
- They responded physically in the womb
- And 2-4 days after birth, they still responded physically when they heard that particular tune
- No wonder St. Paul summed up this mystery of Jesus’ birth by writing:
- “God sent forth his Son, born of a woman” (Gal 4:4)
- “Born of a woman” ⇢ that phrase reminds us that Jesus, our Saviour, became flesh and was revealed in the weakness of our human flesh
- He entered this planet exactly the same way as you and me — via our mother
- St. Ambrose, writing in the late 300s AD, claimed that “Mary is the door through which Christ entered this world”
- 2nd, Mother Mary always points us to Jesus
- Do you remember what Mary’s last spoken words were in the NT?
- Not her last appearance, chronologically-speaking, for we see here again and again in the Gospel narratives
- But what were her last words?
- It was when Jesus and Mary were invited to a wedding in Cana, in Galilee (John 2:5)
- Because the wine ran out, she told the servants to go to Jesus with their problem
- Then she added, “Do whatever he tells you” ⇢ her last words
- Mary always points to Jesus
- And she still says to you and me, “Do whatever he tells you”
- 3rd, Mary is our spiritual mother
- While on the cross, as he breathed his last words:
- Jesus saw his mother and the disciple whom he loved [John] standing beside her, he said to his mother, “Woman, here is your son.” Then he said to the disciple, “Here is your mother” (Joh 19:26-27).
- Our Church understands John in that setting, as representing ALL followers of Jesus
- So, with those words, Jesus appointed Mary the spiritual mother of all believers
- Including you and me
- This past January, Pope Francis spoke about how Mary teaches us to treasure God’s presence in our lives
- How she provides us with her maternal love, guidance, and intercession
- How she also helps us to recognize Jesus’ love ⇢ through her maternal tenderness
- Remember: to whom does she always point? ⇢ to Jesus
- As we honour our earthly mothers on this special weekend
- Let us also honour our spiritual Mother
- As Catholics we honour Mary, by appreciating her role in bringing Jesus into the world
- We honour her because she always points to Jesus
- We honour her role, by appreciating her guidance and protection of us, as we faithfully follow Jesus, her son
