The Dwelling Place of the Spirit

Dear Friend,

Alice Camille, one of my favorite writers on sacred scripture, comes through again this week with a most refreshing insight into this Sunday’s Gospel from John - the wedding feast at Cana. She writes: “Mary gives birth to Jesus twice: once in Bethlehem, and again in Cana. She pushes Jesus into the destiny they both know awaits him, and like a woman in labor, she knows better than he does when ‘the hour has come’.” 

Alice is referring, of course, to the exchange between Jesus and his mother over the fact that the wine is running low at the wedding banquet. Something needs to be done but Jesus seems reluctant to step up and address the situation. That doesn’t stop Mary, who starts lining up the servers, and we know how the story ends: Jesus does step up and vats of water become the very best wine, in abundance. Mary’s timing could not have been better.

My mind goes back to our Advent retreat with Mary, Queen of the Angels, and Patron of Wendy Wright’s hometown, where right now, life and hope are draining away for so many. We learned from Wendy that Mary’s heart – her entire imagination – was the place, like her womb, where she treasured so much. She invites us there, to be attuned to our lives, as she was to hers, and to our world, as places layered with unseen and divine presences. Time itself becomes the dwelling place of the Spirit, the source of divine gifts in face of so much suffering. As I write this, something new is coming to birth, Mary’s pushing us: we have work to do, a new path is opening, and we have a companion who can bring us life in abundance when we are most in need.

Gratefully,

Father Dan ofm, Pastor