Une Minute avec Marie
Faire connaître et aimer Marie
A shadow crept into Joseph's happiness. Mary was now lost to him: he would be alone, and she too would be alone forever. All this was so unexpected, so mysterious and so incredible that Joseph did not know what to do; but it is at this moment that his holiness and spiritual wisdom came to the fore.
It is then that he reacted as a just man, fully adjusted to God's will. In the face of uncertainty, he chose the solution that was most respectful of Mary. This is the mark of a good man with a big heart.
He had too much respect for Mary to condemn her to the reprobation of the whole village, and he had too much respect for God's law to establish his home on such uncertain grounds. So, with a heavy heart, he decided to give Mary back her freedom.
The greatness of Joseph's soul was rooted in God, and God came to meet his servant to reveal his plan to him. From this moment on, everything became clearer: Joseph understood Mary's silence; he grasped with the intuition of faith what God expected of her and of him. Once again, God brought them together to place them both at the heart of the history of salvation. She would give the Messiah her flesh and her features; he, the son of David and a carpenter, would give him a name in the royal line of David.
Faced with Mary's pregnancy, Joseph responded with the greatest respect for her person and with the most docile obedience to God's plan. This is how we should approach the mystery of God's action in us, in others and in the world. This is how we should position our faith, when the Son of God comes.
From the beginning, Mary's maternity was veiled in silence like all the great works of God, an impenetrable silence which no one will ever pierce. Like Joseph, we should respond with an adoring “yes” to God.
Mary's maternity has no other explanation than God's love for the world and his infinitely free choice to intimately involve a woman in his work of re-Creation. And since it was God himself who made this choice, since it was he who loved, wanted and prepared Mary, let us not be afraid to welcome her into our homes, to make room for her in our memory, in our prayer and in our hearts - yes in our hearts, because everything that comes to us through her will bear the stamp of the Holy Spirit.
Father Jean Lévêque, Carmelite of the Province of Paris