Sermon at Parish Mass The Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary 2014

Revelation 11:19-12:6,10

Galatians 4:4-7

Luke 1:46-55

Be careful, this is a trick question: what does a magnifying glass do?

Of course, a magnifying glass doesn’t make things bigger, but enlarges our vision of what it focuses on. It enables us to see more.

Today Mary proclaims “my soul magnifies the Lord”. The Magnificat, that song of praise so familiar at evening prayer and choral evensong.

Mary in her great hymn of praise does not make God bigger, which would be absurd, but enlarges our vision. She is focussed on God, and so enables us to see more.

How does she do this? What can we learn from Mary?

Firstly, she knows the scriptures. She knows God’s promises and that he will do what he has promised, he will come to save Israel and through Israel the whole world. Her hymn of praise is modelled on the song of Hannah in 1 Samuel. Hannah was a devout and righteous woman who could not have children until she prayed in the temple, and then she conceived and bore a son, the prophet Samuel who grew up to guide and judge God’s people.

And Mary is focussed only on God’s promises. She believes without hesitation. She doesn’t look on her own situation and doubt because of it. A girl or young woman, perhaps about 14, in a disregarded backwater town in a corner of the world under Roman authority. She doesn’t consider that and think, “well, this isn’t very likely, is it?” God has promised to save his people, he has sent the angel to announce that he is going to do this now, through her, and that is enough. She believes.

So this is the first thing that Mary teaches the Church today. She knows the scriptures. She knows that the story of God’s salvation is being worked out through history. She knows that she is part of that story, and she believes that the promises made by the Lord will be fulfilled. Mary is faithful because God is faithful. So, too, the Church is called to believe and be faithful.

Secondly, the great theme of Mary’s song is praise and thanksgiving. She rejoices, she exults, she magnifies. As the Magnificat rings out we can almost hear Mary jumping for joy.

And this too is the principal and greatest part of the prayer of the church: praise and thanksgiving, shot through with joy. Our central act of worship is the Eucharist, which means “thanksgiving”, and the Eucharistic prayer sums up the praise and thanksgiving of the Church for all that God has done. And this note, this theme, should carry over into all our life of prayer, corporately and privately. We don’t often hear Cranmer’s general thanksgiving these days but it is a wonderful prayer to use in our daily life:

“We bless thee for our creation, preservation, and all the blessings of this life; but above all, for thine inestimable love in the redemption of the world by our Lord Jesus Christ; for the means of grace, and for the hope of glory.”

A spirit of gratitude and a spirit of joy go together, by them we lift up the world and ourselves to God.

And note that Mary has no false humility about her praise, no wallowing or grovelling: “Surely, from now on all generations will call me blessed; for the Mighty One has done great things for me”. And he has! What great things! Greater than any creature before or since, chosen and prepared to be the mother of the saviour, exalted far above the cherubim and more glorious than the seraphim.

We do not magnify the Lord by diminishing his works. There is a strand of Christianity which fears that we will not make enough of God if we pay too much attention to the things God has done. But Mary teaches us otherwise, and Catholic Christianity understands this, in all its branches, Eastern and Roman and Anglican. We do not make God greater by belittling his works. So we do make a big deal of Mary, and the saints, and the sacraments. And by doing so we magnify the Lord, because these are his works, the great things he has done.

So the life of the Church, taught by Mary, is filled with joy and praise and thanksgiving, and magnifies the Lord in his works, looking out to the world he is saving and looking for the signs of his kingdom so that our praises will be increased more and more.

Thirdly, Mary teaches us to look for the signs of God’s Kingdom appearing in our midst. And she tells us that it will be a revolution:

He has scattered the proud in the thoughts of their hearts.

He has brought down the powerful from their thrones,

and lifted up the lowly;

he has filled the hungry with good things,

and sent the rich away empty.

This is not any old revolution. There have been many human revolutions through history. We know the world is broken, and we long for it to be fixed. But somehow human beings by themselves seem incapable of doing so. Human revolutions tend to end up not fixing the system but just replacing the people who are in charge.

Melvyn Bragg has been presenting a series on the television about famous radicals. One programme was about Thomas Paine, the author of “The Rights of Man”, who got very enthusiastic about the American Revolution and wrote “We have it in our power to begin the world over again”. Bless his heart, but the subsequent history of the United States doesn’t really bear him out on that one. No human power can begin the world again. Only the Holy Spirit of God, the Creator Spirit who hovered over the deep in the beginning, can re-create the world.

And that revolution, the one revolution we need and long for, has begun. When the Creator Spirit overshadowed Mary so that she became the God-Bearer, the new world, the Kingdom of God, began in her.

It is through the indwelling of the Holy Spirit that the revolution begins, and takes root, and spreads. The inner transformation of the Kingdom of God begins in us when we put down the mighty Ego and instead humbly find our true identity in God. It begins when we feed our hungry souls with the word of the Kingdom which is repentance and justice and peace, and stop feeding ourselves with possessions which never satisfy. And from that inner transformation the Kingdom spreads into the world, so that all God’s children can be caught up and freed in the one revolution that actually will begin the world again.

So, three things that Mary teaches the Church in her great hymn of praise:

Firstly, know the scriptures. Know that humanity has a story and that God is acting in that story to save us. Know his promises and believe that they will be fulfilled.

Secondly, praise and thanksgiving, exultation and joy should be the chief note of the Church’s life. Rejoice in the Lord always, says St Paul. And rejoice in his works, for by doing so we do not diminish the Lord but magnify him.

Thirdly, expect the revolution! God’s kingdom is at hand, the transformation of the world by his Holy Spirit which begins in our hearts. This world of sin and strife and violence is not the final reality, and God is acting through his Church as he acted through Mary to bring about his new creation of righteousness and peace. No wonder we have cause, with Mary, to rejoice.