📖 Homily Today

More Blessed Than the Womb: Clothed in Christ, Keepers of the Word

My dear friends in Christ, in today's Gospel a woman in the crowd cannot hold back her admiration. Listening to Jesus, she cries out, "Blessed is the womb that carried you and the breasts at which you nursed." It is a beautiful, very human thing to say. She is praising the mother of a remarkable son.

Jesus does not reject her praise, but He lifts it higher: "Rather, blessed are those who hear the word of God and observe it." At first this might sound like a small correction of His mother. In fact, it is the greatest compliment Mary could ever receive.

Saint Augustine understood this well. He taught that Mary was more blessed in receiving the faith of Christ than in conceiving the flesh of Christ. Before she carried the Word in her womb, she welcomed Him in her heart with her "yes." Her blood relationship to Jesus was a unique gift, but what made her holy was that she heard God's word and kept it, pondering it in her heart all her life.

And here is the good news, brothers and sisters: that kind of blessedness is open to every one of us. None of us can be the mother of Jesus by blood. All of us can become His family by faith.

That is exactly what Saint Paul is telling the Galatians in our first reading. He describes the Law of Moses as a "disciplinarian." In the ancient world this was a household servant who walked a child to school, kept him out of trouble, and corrected him along the way. He was necessary and good, but temporary. When the child grew up, he no longer needed the servant. He took his place as an heir in his father's house.

Paul says that is what Christ has done for us. "Through faith you are all children of God in Christ Jesus. For all of you who were baptized into Christ have clothed yourselves with Christ." Not servants walked to the door, but sons and daughters invited inside.

Think of the white garment placed on a child at baptism. The Church says to that child, "You have become a new creation, and have clothed yourself in Christ." That little white cloth is a sign of something astonishing. God does not merely tolerate us. He dresses us in His own Son, so that when the Father looks at us, He sees Jesus.

And then Paul adds that in Christ "there is neither Jew nor Greek, slave nor free, male and female." Our background, our status, our past, none of it determines whether we belong. Belonging is a gift received in faith and baptism, and it makes us one family.

Dear friends, this changes how we see ourselves. Some of us carry a quiet sense that we are not good enough for God, that we are still just trying to follow rules and avoid punishment. Paul says: you have grown past that. You are an heir. And Jesus tells us what heirs do: they listen to the Father's word and live it.

So here is a simple step for this week. Take one line from today's readings, perhaps "you have clothed yourselves with Christ," and carry it with you. When you dress in the morning, say it quietly. Let it remind you who you are, and then ask the Lord for the grace to keep His word that day in one concrete way: a patient answer, a kindness, a forgiveness.

In a few moments, the Word who took flesh in Mary's womb will become present on this altar. When we receive Him in Holy Communion, we too carry Christ within us. May we receive Him as Mary did, with hearts that hear and keep His word, so that we may share her blessedness and live as the children of God we truly are. Amen.

Sources Consulted - St. Augustine, *De Sancta Virginitate* (On Holy Virginity), 3 - St. Bede the Venerable, *Commentary on Luke* (on Luke 11:27-28, cited in the Office of Readings) - Catechism of the Catholic Church, nos. 148-149, 1243, 1265-1266, 1972 - Second Vatican Council, *Lumen Gentium*, nos. 56-58 - Pope Benedict XVI, *Verbum Domini*, nos. 27-28 - *Ignatius Catholic Study Bible: New Testament* (Hahn and Mitch), notes on Galatians 3 and Luke 11 - *The New Jerome Biblical Commentary*, on Galatians 3:23-29 and Luke 11:27-28 - USCCB Daily Readings, NABRE text