P. Gorazd Cetkovský, O.Carm.
When you have the opportunity, take a close look again at the altar in the pilgrimage church of Our Lady of Mount Carmel in Kostelní Vydří. Notice how baroque art1 loved to dramatize: the design of the altar expresses movement and action. The gestures of the angels indicate that the loving Marian image seems to "fly" through space. It descends from heaven and approaches you, who stand before the altar. It is surrounded by a radiant light, dazzling even the angels themselves. This is a reminder of the special light phenomena that initially drew attention to this place. But the main significance lies in what is depicted in the painting itself: Mary holds the Child Jesus in her arms, of whom Simeon prophesied that he would be the "Light of the nations" and that a great opposition would arise against him... Let us not hesitate to dramatize a little ourselves and try to imagine how tightly Mary must have held the Child to her after she heard Simeon's words and took her child back into her arms!
Within each of us, a child remains for a lifetime. Some of us are quite transparent in this, while in others this "child" is hidden deep, deep... And how do children react when they see the care and love given to another child? They cry out: "I want that too!" Recently, some parents happily told me that when their older daughter caught a cold and got sick and her mother cared for her, the younger sister stated: "I want to be sick too!" – and soon she also developed a fever. We adults, for the most part, do not consciously recognize such children's outcries, but before the vivid image of Our Lady of Mount Carmel, we feel intuitively: this pilgrimage site and this image offer us: "Mary will embrace you too, hold you close, shower you with love, care, and prayer – come and receive it!" And when I express it this way, it is not an exaggeration, a play on words, or a daydream. It is truly Mary's offer, and I want to challenge us: let us accept this offer of hers and simply ask: "Yes, Mary, embrace me too!" And let us not think only of ourselves. Let us also place our loved ones in her arms: our husband or wife, children, grandchildren, friends...
But I will add one more encouragement to this contemplation, which feels very important to me right now. Pope Benedict XVI proclaimed the year of priests. It was just recently initiated, and we have the opportunity to utilize it right from the beginning. So I want to ask each one of us now: place your priest, the priest of your parish, into the arms of Our Lady as well. Do you like him? Then do it all the more willingly! Do you have a problem with him? – Then please do it as well! Mary will press him to herself with great love. And in such a prayer and with the faith that Mary really will do it, we may clearly realize that we do love our priest and we owe him a lot! Or we may suddenly realize that we ourselves owe him some of our love, that perhaps we need to forgive him for something, or adopt a different attitude towards him than we have so far.
Some time ago, I was greatly enriched when I got to know the parents of a priest, a classmate of mine from the seminary. In meeting them, I understood that these simple, good people bear two powerful fears: the first – that their son as a priest would have enough love for his parishioners, that he would serve them well and that they would "accept" him and love him. And the second fear of those parents was: that their son would not leave the priesthood. Because occasionally such departures occur and grieve many. And since then, I have often thought: let us also try to see our priests sometimes "from the other side" – through the eyes of caring, devout parents who love God and their child, who has devoted himself to His service, through the eyes of Mary, who maternally embraces this priest and seeks to give him the greatest support for his service.
And now I will only explain which texts from the Holy Scriptures I have chosen for our contemplation. The pivotal passage is from the Gospel of Luke about the meeting of the Holy Family with Simeon in the Jerusalem temple (Lk 2:25–35). The evangelist writes that Simeon "took the child in his arms", according to the Latin version, we could translate it literally: "to the elbows". This word occurs rarely in Scripture, we also find it in the prophet Isaiah (49:22–23): "Thus says the Lord, God: Behold, I will raise my hand to the nations, and I will lift up my sign to the peoples. They shall bring your sons in their arms, and your daughters shall be carried on their shoulders. Kings shall be your foster fathers, and queens your nursing mothers..." I hesitated for a long time whether to use this text for our reflection. The prophet encourages the chosen nation, suffering in Babylonian captivity. He promises the Israelites a glorious return to their homeland. Although there was, in earlier times, a greater incapacity among nations to tolerate one another, the pagan nations will overcome their alienation towards God’s people and – precisely because they are people of the Lord – they will help him and serve him. Even in such a way that they take his children in their arms and on their shoulders and thus will carry them to Jerusalem... Is this fitting for our topic? Yes. These verses from the Old Testament may encourage us to strive to overcome all the alienation that sometimes creeps between us and our priests, and to "carry them" through our cooperation with them in their service. And also: precisely because they are servants of Jesus Christ in His church and in today’s world.
On the other hand, I did not hesitate for a moment when I thought to include in this reflection a passage from the first letter of the Apostle Paul to the Corinthians, which we commonly know as the Hymn to Love (1 Cor 12:31–13:8). It is a bit of provocation on my part, because we are used to thoughtlessly associating this text with weddings, whereas now we recall it in connection with a completely different aspect of life. But Saint Paul did not write these lines only for fiancés and spouses and so that we would have something to read in church during weddings. In his letter, he speaks of love as the foundation of Christian life in all its areas, as a foundation for the church community as a whole. We must not narrow the reach of God's word to just a specific slice. Thus, it is beneficial for us at the start of the year of priests and during contemplation of the relationships between you, the faithful laity, and priests, and us, priests, with the parishioners to return to the words: love is patient, kind, does not envy, does not get angry, etc. May we not lack an abundance of love in these relationships.
May the example of the maternal love of Mary help us in this. May we well experience the year focused on the sanctification of priests under her protection.
