20241209 BE IT DONE UNTO ME ACCORDING TO YOUR WILL
First reading |
Genesis 3:9-15,20 |
The mother of all those who live
After Adam had eaten of the tree the Lord God called to him. ‘Where are you?’ he asked. ‘I heard the sound of you in the garden;’ he replied ‘I was afraid because I was naked, so I hid.’ ‘Who told you that you were naked?’ he asked ‘Have you been eating of the tree I forbade you to eat?’ The man replied, ‘It was the woman you put with me; she gave me the fruit, and I ate it.’ Then the Lord God asked the woman, ‘What is this you have done?’ The woman replied, ‘The serpent tempted me and I ate.’
Then the Lord God said to the serpent, ‘Because you have done this,
‘Be accursed beyond all cattle,
all wild beasts.
You shall crawl on your belly and eat dust
every day of your life.
I will make you enemies of each other:
you and the woman,
your offspring and her offspring.
It will crush your head
and you will strike its heel.’
The man named his wife ‘Eve’ because she was the mother of all those who live.
Responsorial Psalm |
Psalm 97(98):1-4 |
Sing a new song to the Lord for he has worked wonders.
Sing a new song to the Lord
for he has worked wonders.
His right hand and his holy arm
have brought salvation.
Sing a new song to the Lord for he has worked wonders.
The Lord has made known his salvation;
has shown his justice to the nations.
He has remembered his truth and love
for the house of Israel.
Sing a new song to the Lord for he has worked wonders.
All the ends of the earth have seen
the salvation of our God.
Shout to the Lord, all the earth,
ring out your joy.
Sing a new song to the Lord for he has worked wonders.
Second reading |
Ephesians 1:3-6,11-12 |
Before the world was made, God chose us in Christ
Blessed be God the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ,
who has blessed us with all the spiritual blessings of heaven in Christ.
Before the world was made, he chose us, chose us in Christ,
to be holy and spotless, and to live through love in his presence,
determining that we should become his adopted sons, through Jesus Christ
for his own kind purposes,
to make us praise the glory of his grace,
his free gift to us in the Beloved,
And it is in him that we were claimed as God’s own,
chosen from the beginning,
under the predetermined plan of the one who guides all things
as he decides by his own will;
chosen to be,
for his greater glory,
the people who would put their hopes in Christ before he came.
Gospel Acclamation | cf.Lk1:28 |
Alleluia, alleluia!
Hail Mary, full of grace, the Lord is with thee!
Blessed art thou among women.
Alleluia!
Gospel | Luke 1:26-38 |
'I am the handmaid of the Lord'
The angel Gabriel was sent by God to a town in Galilee called Nazareth, to a virgin betrothed to a man named Joseph, of the House of David; and the virgin’s name was Mary. He went in and said to her, ‘Rejoice, so highly favoured! The Lord is with you.’ She was deeply disturbed by these words and asked herself what this greeting could mean, but the angel said to her, ‘Mary, do not be afraid; you have won God’s favour. Listen! You are to conceive and bear a son, and you must name him Jesus. He will be great and will be called Son of the Most High. The Lord God will give him the throne of his ancestor David; he will rule over the House of Jacob for ever and his reign will have no end.’ Mary said to the angel, ‘But how can this come about, since I am a virgin?’ ‘The Holy Spirit will come upon you’ the angel answered ‘and the power of the Most High will cover you with its shadow. And so the child will be holy and will be called Son of God. Know this too: your kinswoman Elizabeth has, in her old age, herself conceived a son, and she whom people called barren is now in her sixth month, for nothing is impossible to God.’ ‘I am the handmaid of the Lord,’ said Mary ‘let what you have said be done to me.’ And the angel left her.
09 December 2024, Monday, The Immaculate Conception of the Blessed Virgin Mary
“BE IT DONE UNTO ME ACCORDING TO YOUR WILL” (LUKE 1:38)
SCRIPTURE READINGS: [Gen 3:9-15.20; Ps 98:1-4; Eph 1:3-6.11-12; Lk 1:26-38]
Today, we celebrate the Solemnity of the Immaculate Conception. In celebrating Mary’s immaculate conception, we are celebrating the integrity of Mary. The solemn teaching of the Church through the centuries is that Mary was conceived without sin. She was as pure as the lily of the valley. She was given the grace of God to be protected from Original sin and the effects of original sin, such as the disorientation of the will, which we call concupiscence. Unlike us, Mary was given the grace to overcome the temptations of the flesh. She was conceived immaculately by the grace of God in view of her calling to be the mother of the Saviour. In a real way, the words of St Paul in today’s second reading applies eminently to her. “Before the world was made, he chose us, chose us in Christ, to be holy and spotless, and to live through love in his presence. And it is in him that we were claimed as God’s own, chosen from the beginning, under the predetermined plan of the one who guides all things as he decides by his own will; chosen to be, for his greater glory, the people who put their hopes in Christ before he came.” Mary was in a special way chosen by God for Christ and for us all. Hence, she was redeemed by Christ in anticipation of His passion, death and resurrection.
In total freedom, Mary chose the will of God at every stage of her life. She lived in God’s presence, and in accordance with His predetermined plan for her. In a most concrete way, we see how the grace of God was at work in her when she responded without hesitation to God’s call for her to be the mother of the Saviour. When the angel approached her and explained to her how it would be possible even though she was a virgin, immediately, she said, “I am the handmaid of the Lord, let what you have said be done to me.” Mary lived her life with integrity and for this reason, she became the channel of grace to us who come to her. Perhaps for this reason, she is also fittingly the channel of healing for those who seek her intercession.
But lasting healing for our mind, soul and body can only come about through the recognition of God’s plan for us in our lives and doing His will. Indeed, peace in life is not as difficult as some people think. If we lack peace of mind and soul, which eventually affects our body, it is because we reject the plan of God in our lives, or we choose to do things our way instead of His way. This was the case of Adam and Eve. They wanted to be like God without the grace of God. In truth, God has already created them to be like Him, sharing in His intellect and will, creating them in His image and likeness. As a consequence, they lost their likeness because they did not trust that God will grant them the happiness and freedom they have. They trusted in themselves. As a consequence, they lost the preternatural gifts of paradise, namely, the gift of infused knowledge, integrity of mind and body, the acceptance of pain and suffering, and the end of life on earth. From then on, humanity was assumed the dullness of mind and intellect, concupiscence, which is the disorder of the will, the fear of suffering, and most of all, the inability to accept death as the way to life.
Today, if we want to find true healing of body, soul and mind, we must once again regain our understanding of the will of God for us all. God is not our enemy. God is not against us. God does not want us to suffer. God does not want us to die and be annihilated from the face of the earth. On the contrary, as St Paul assures us, God has always intended us from all eternity to be “holy and spotless, and to live through love in his presence, determining that we should become his adopted sons, through Jesus Christ for his own purposes, to make us praise the glory of his grace, his free gift to us in the Beloved.” Clearly, the vision and plan of God for us is that we become His adopted sons through Christ Jesus. We are called to be sons and daughters through Christ who shows us the way to recover our sonship and daughtership. If we walk in His presence, that is, if we walk the way of our Lord, the way of obedience to the Father’s will as His mother did, we will find peace, happiness and joy in our lives.
Indeed, the key to find integrity of mind and body is truly to seek the will of God in our lives. We need to ask ourselves what God’s will is for us concretely in our lives. This calls for fidelity to our vocation. In seeking our vocation, the role of parents, priests, religious, friends and faith-filled people are of utmost importance. We must be seeking to do the will of God and not our own. To find real happiness in life, we must seek to fulfil our vocation, His plan for each one of us here on this earth, within His divine plan for the whole of humanity. Each of us must do our part by responding to God’s call according to the charism He has given to us, according to the circumstances we have been placed in life, and according to the needs and challenges place in our situation.
Mary found peace because she was obedient to the Lord’s call. The peace that we speak about does not exempt us from suffering, rejection, being misunderstood or even wrongly accused. Certainly, she had to work out God’s vocation in her life through the historical situation she was in. She had to face the difficulties of explaining her pregnancy to Joseph and her family and relatives. She had to contend with the possibility of being alienated or shamed in public. She had to struggle with Joseph after the birth of Jesus like all other mothers, finding ways to protect her son from the forces of evil as in the persecution of King Herod. She had to endure the shame with Jesus when He was falsely condemned on the cross and put to death. But she was a woman of peace even when her heart, as Simeon prophesied, would be pierced with a sword, or rather, swords. But because she was aligned with the divine plan of God, knowing that it was the will of God, she remained firm in times of persecution and sorrow. She did not hold grudges against the enemy of her Son, nor accused them of hypocrisy, injustice, or condemned them. She suffered patiently and, like her Son, entrusted her life to the heavenly Father.
So, too, her Son, Jesus. He found peace because all His life, He had only one desire, which was to do the will of His Father. On various occasions in the gospel, Jesus said in different ways that He had come to do the will of His Father. The Father and Him were one. He was the voice of the Father and all that He did, He did it in union with the Father who worked through Him. Indeed, His one desire was to save humanity and His people Israel from destruction. He came to set them free from sin and from ignorance of the Father’s love and mercy. Like Mary, His mother who said at the beginning, “let what you have said be done to me”, Jesus summed up His life at the Garden of Gethsemane when He said, “Father, if you are willing, remove this cup from me; yet, not my will but yours be done.” (Lk 22:42) Finally, He commended His Spirit to the Father on the cross.
Today as we celebrate the Feast of the Immaculate Conception, we too must show ourselves to be authentic sons and daughters of God in Christ. We must show ourselves to be like Mary who leads us in restoring our dignity as the sons and daughters of God by seeking to do His holy will in our lives, being faithful to our vocation no matter how difficult it is, because we seek to do His will and not ours. By being faithful to our vocation and living the life of Christ in holiness and in integrity, we will find peace of mind and healing of our bodies. This means that we will live our lives in such a way that we will not destroy our body, contaminate our minds and harden our hearts by allowing the temptations of the world to make us lose our perspective in life. Walking in integrity, humility and obedience to the Lord’s call, our vocation and His way of life, we will find peace and healing for ourselves.
Written by His Eminence, Cardinal William SC Goh, Roman Catholic Archbishop of Singapore © All Rights Reserved.
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