Note: Although today is the 23rd Sunday in Ordinary Time, Year B, since it is the 8th of September, the readings for the Feast of the Nativity of Our Lady are observed.
Reflection on the Readings for the Solemnity of the Nativity of the Blessed Virgin Mary:
When someone celebrates their birthday, it is a beautiful gesture to show them love and appreciation by giving them a gift. A gift is one of the ways we express our love for one another, and in this way, the invisible love manifests itself in a visible form. Today we are celebrating the birth of the Blessed Virgin Mary, the Mother of the Lord and our Mother. On this occasion, it is not we who give a gift to our Mother Mary, but first and foremost, she gives it to us. Mary is a source of gifts and graces for the whole world, and especially for us Maltese and Gozitans. It was precisely on the 8th of September that two great sieges of Malta came to an end: the Great Siege of 1565 and that of the Second World War in 1943. How grateful we should be to God and to Our Lady for taking care of us, a small island in the middle of the sea, during such delicate moments in our history.
If we look closely at today's readings, we can draw some beautiful lessons from them. The First Reading tells us: “This is what the Lord says: You, Bethlehem Ephrathah, small among the clans of Judah, from you shall come forth for me one who is to be ruler in Israel; his origin is from of old, from ancient times.” The Lord chooses the small to confound those who think they are something special, and this is evident not only in Mary but also in our Malta, for in both sieges the Lord chose us, a small country, to confound those who wanted to dominate and crush the small. But are we content to be among the small? Have we in our time succumbed to the temptation of pride, wishing to be great so that, in our minds, we become something we can never be? Today, we need to reflect deeply on whether we, as a people and as individuals, are content to be small as we are, or if we have been infected with the disease of ambition and entered a competition to become something, to match the great. Let us not forget that God is always on the side of the small.
In today's second reading, Saint Paul tells us: “We know that in everything God works for good with those who love him, who are called according to his purpose.” This is surely one of the most beautiful sentences in the Bible. As they say in English, this sentence is "empowering"; this means that anyone who understands it and lives it finds the strength to face every circumstance of life with courage, trusting that God can bring out the good for them and for others through them, from every experience in life, even those that seem negative in our eyes. God works in everything with those who love Him and let Him work in them, always for their good. How much we need to believe this, how much we see it in Mary's life, through whom God has done great things throughout the world.
We also see all of this in today’s Gospel: in that list of names, the ancestors of Jesus, there are all sorts of people, good and not so good, saints and sinners, because God wants to work in the life of every person, whoever they are. In God's eyes, even the greatest sinner has a chance to change his life and become an instrument in His hands to do great things through him. The Gospel mentions Joseph, a just and simple man, of no importance in the eyes of the world, but whom God chose for the second greatest mission ever given by Him, after that of Mary, his wife. Joseph’s greatness is not because he is famous, but because he always sought to fulfil the will of the Lord in his life. Let us ask ourselves: God intervened in our history to save us in very difficult moments; how much do I believe that God intervenes in my story too, if I open my heart to Him and let Him work in me and through me? Do I believe that God can show me His love even through the difficult circumstances of my life? What is most important to me, my reputation, how people see me, or how much I do God's will in my life?
Lord, today we ask you to bless our small land with a special blessing and help us understand that even smallness has its greatness, not greatness according to the standards of this world, but greatness in your eyes, you who choose the small to confound the proud, just as you chose Mary to be a new dawn of hope for the whole world. Amen.
