Awakenings

by Father Thomas Keating

Events in Jesus' Ministry

Chapter 14

Our Lady of Sorrows

Standing by the cross of Jesus were his mother and his mother's sister, Mary the wife of Clopas, and Mary Magdala. When Jesus saw his mother and the disciple there whom he loved, he said to his mother, "Woman, behold, your son." Then he said to the disciple, "Behold your mother." And from that hour the disciple took her into his home.
(John 19:25-27)

    The incidents in the Gospel of John have a significance far beyond the literal events that are described. Thus the words that Jesus spoke on the cross have meaning beyond his obvious concern about who was going to take care of his mother after his death. Christian tradition has developed the idea of the mother of Jesus as the new Eve, his companion in the monumental work of redemption and the opening of human awareness to unlimited growth. Mary has a close relationship to our own inner growth toward the full awareness of the Ultimate Reality. She is mother of the new humanity, the new creation that the gospel invites us to join and into which the sacrifice of Jesus initiates us. Mary has a special significance for contemplatives who are deliberately seeking to enter into this consciousness.

    The Spirit of God penetrates us in somewhat the way the human soul penetrates every cell in the body. In virtue of baptism and the gift of faith, the program of the body of Christ is coded within each of us. Our intuitive faculties are freed from the limitations of the senses and reasoning not by rejecting them, but by going beyond them and opening to the intuitive level of consciousness. The stages of contemplative prayer are levels of assimilation to the risen life of Christ. We put our human life, uniqueness, and talents into the transcendent project of manifesting God and transforming the present world into the new creation. Mary's intimate relationship with Christ, her disposition of self surrender, her alert receptivity, and her promptness in responding to the wishes of the Spirit are the great contemplative virtues.

    Standing beside the cross, she participated in the inauguration of the new creation. The apostles were wiped out in the face of Christ's crucifixion. John alone remained, though at a good distance; all the others left the scene and fled. The human props of their faith disappeared when Jesus was no longer cheered by the multitudes. When he was rejected by the ecclesiastical and civil authorities, the apostles were devastated. Their faith was dependent on human supports. When these were gone, so were they.

    Mary, however, stayed by the cross. Her faith was not extinguished. The apostles saw Jesus as the Messiah but were not clear about his divinity Mary was as clear as crystal about it. If they beheld Christ's destruction as the end of everything, what must she have felt when she looked upon Jesus not merely as the Messiah, but as God himself? The Eternal Word is the person whom she knew as her son. For her, God was dying, so to speak. The death of God was never so poignant a human experience as for her. This is the sword that pierced her heart. She was grieving not only for her son and for the Messiah; she was grieving for God. Only she perceived the depth of the mystery of the cross, of God throwing himself away, so to speak, for the salvation of insensitive and ungrateful people.

    Mary is the paradigm of those who are manifesting Christ in their individual lives. Her compassion was rooted in the kind of love that God has for us--a love that is tender, firm, and completely self giving. God-consciousness is the fruit of Christ's passion, death, resurrection, and ascension. In the ascension Jesus enters with his humanity into the heart of all creation where he dwells everywhere and in everything, visible only to the X-ray eyes of faith that penetrate through every disguise including the greatest of sorrows. God is reigning despite all appearances to the contrary. The risen Christ is ever-present, opening the way for the final triumph of God in which, as Paul says, "God will be all in all." This is the faith that Mary had when she looked on what was left of the flesh of her son and yet saw him reigning from the cross-- the triumph of God hidden in the greatest suffering. This makes her our companion and support in every conceivable trial.

This chapter is taken from the book Awakenings by Fr. Thomas Keating. You can obtain a copy from the Bookstore.  See Awakenings