Homily for Thursday, Week 20 of Ordinary Time

Homily for Thursday
20th Week of Ordinary Time
Queenship of Mary

August 22, 2024
Ezek 36: 23-28
Christian Brothers, St. Joseph’s Residence, N.R.

“I will prove the holiness of my great name … thru you” (Ezek 36: 23).

(Michelangelo)

After denouncing his people for their idolatries and other profanations of the covenant between himself and Israel, the Lord God announces a cleansing of his people, a restoration to their homeland, “a new heart and a new spirit” within them (36:26).  That new heart and new spirit will reflect his own holiness.

We celebrate today the one human person who was so filled with the Lord’s spirit and so clean of heart that she’s been given a special place at the wedding feast of God’s Son, a place as the Son’s mother.  (I said “the one human person” because, you remember, Jesus Christ tho possessing a human nature isn’t a human person but a divine person.)  Mary’s association with the Great King’s Son renders her a queen.  In his graciousness, our Lord Jesus has given her to us as our mother too.  As our mother, she guides and helps us more than ruling over us, even as Jesus said the great ones among his followers must be the servants of all.

From a book of Hours, ca. 1485

As mother and helper, our queen mother wants above all to help her Son’s people reflect his holiness.  She is the Help of Christians, that we might live our calling to “prove the holiness of [Jesus’] great name.”  With our hearts cleansed in Baptism and frequent Reconciliation, with our spirits thus renewed, we’re empowered to show God’s holiness to the world, to be saints invited into the wedding feast of the Son.