LENT 2024: DAY 34 - Saturday March 23

 

“Our Lord spoke seven times from the Cross; these are called His Seven Last Words. In the Scriptures the dying words of only three others were recorded: Israel, Moses, and Stephen. The reason perhaps is that no others are found so significant and representative as these three. Israel was the first of the Israelites; Moses, the first of the legal dispensation; Stephen, the first Christian martyr. The dying words of each began something sublime in the history of God’s dealings with men.

 

In His goodness, Our Blessed Lord left His thoughts on dying, for He – more than Israel, more than Moses, more than Stephen – was representative of all humanity. In this sublime hour He called all His children to the pulpit of the Cross, and every word He said to them was set down for the purpose of an eternal publication and an undying consolation. There was never a preacher like the dying Christ; there was never a congregation like that which gathered about the pulpit of the Cross; there was never a sermon like the Seven Last Words.

 

The Third Word:

 

The third message of Our Lord from the Cross contained exactly the same word that was used in addressing His mother at the marriage feast of Cana. When she, for the sake of the embarrassed host, made the simple prayer that the guests had no wine, He answered: “Woman, what is that to Me when My Hour is not yet come?” Our Lord always used the word “Hour” in relation to His Passion and His death.

 

In our own language, Our Lord was saying to His Blessed Mother at Cana… “My dear mother, do you realize that you are asking Me to proclaim My Divinity – to appear before the world as the Son of God, and to prove my Divinity by My works and My miracles? The moment that I do this, I begin the royal road to the Cross. When I am no longer known among men as the son of the carpenter, but as the Son of God, that will be My first step toward Calvary… I now… call you – Woman. It was to you that I referred when I said to Satan that I would put enmity between him and the woman, between his brood of evil and your seed, Which I am. That great title of “Woman” I dignify you with now. And I shall dignify you with it again when My Hour comes and when I am unfurled upon the Cross.

 

Three years had passed. Our Blessed Lord now looked down from His Cross to the two most beloved creatures that He had on earth – John and His Blessed Mother. He picked up the refrain of Cana, addressed Our Blessed Mother with the same title He gave Her at the marriage feast. He called her “Woman.”… With a gesture of his dust-filled eyes and His thorn-crowned head, He looked longingly at Her… and He said:

 

“Woman, this is thy son.”

 

To His beloved disciple He said:

 

“This is thy mother.”

(John 19:26-27)

 

 

There were two great periods in the relations of Jesus and Mary, the first extending from the Crib to Cana, and second, from Cana to the Cross… From Bethlehem to Cana, Mary had Jesus, as a mother has a son; she even called Him familiarly “Son”, at the age of twelve, as if that were her usual mode of address. He was with her during those thirty years, fleeing in her arms to Egypt, living at Nazareth, and being subject to her. He was hers, and she was His, and even at the very moment when they walked into the wedding feast, her name was mentioned first: “Mary, the mother of Jesus, was there.”

 

But from Cana on, there is a growing detachment… A year after Cana, as a devoted mother, she followed Him in His preaching. It was announced to Our Lord that His mother was seeking Him. Our Lord with seeming unconcern, turned to the crowd and asked: “Who is a mother to Me?” (Matthew 12:48) Then revealing the great Christian mystery that relationship is not dependent on flesh and blood, but on union with Divine nature through grace, he added: “If anyone does the will of My Father, Who is in heaven, he is My brother, and sister, and mother.” (Matthew 12:50)

 

(Chapter 49, pgs. 796 – 800)

 

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