Feast
of the Birth of Mary
September 8, 2015 6:30am
In our Catholic calendar, we do
not celebrate many birthdays.
Obviously, we celebrate Jesus’
birthday on December 25th.
We also celebrate John the
Baptist’s birthday on June 24th, and Mary’s birthday today.
I cannot think of any others.
For most of the saints, we
celebrate the day of their death.
Why is this?
Our Catholic tradition does it
this way because our death marks the end of our earthly journey.
It marks the conclusion of our
efforts here on earth to grow in the image and likeness of God and to follow as
fully as possible the way of Jesus.
Our death then becomes our birth
or birthday into a new kind of life – resurrected life with the Lord Jesus.
And so, practically all of our
saints’ feast days are the days of their death.
But the feast of the birth of
Mary that we celebrate today is an exception.
Why?
In one sense, Mary’s life was a
human journey and she had to deal with challenges and sufferings like the rest
of the saints and the rest of us.
But in another way Mary was very
different.
She was fully one with God and
fully open to God’s will right from the very beginning.
Mary reflected God’s image and
likeness and embraced Jesus’ way fully right from the start.
This is why we celebrate her physical
birth, the beginning of her life on earth.
Mary even at her physical birth
was ready for her birth into resurrected life.
One conclusion from all of this
that I see is that Mary beckons us not to waste time.
She moves us to respond more and
more fully each day to the calling of her Son in the gospels.
That will prepare us for our
birth into resurrected life at the end of our earthly journey.
