Loving a Marian Church (I)

The Marian Church follows Mary to the mountains and goes with her to meet the living. She visits women and men and, beyond their apparent sterility, she is on the lookout for what is being born and what is possible, for the life that throbs in them.

The Marian Church rejoices and sings. Instead of bemoaning her fate and the world's woes, she marvels at what is beautiful on earth and in the human heart. And she sees God’s work everywhere.

The Marian Church knows that she is the recipient of a freely given love and that God has the heart of a mother. She has seen God on the doorstep, expecting the improbable return of his son; she has seen him embrace his son, slip a ring on his finger, then call for the homecoming feast himself ...

She "does not put out the smoldering wick." When she finds someone on the roadside, wounded by life, she is seized by compassion. And with infinite tenderness, she tends to his wounds. She is the safe and ever-open harbor, the refuge of sinners, mater misericordiae, the mother of mercy.

François Marc, Marist

Excerpt from Pour une Eglise mariale (For a Marian Church), published in La Croix, November 11, 1996 issue

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