Catholic for a Reason II: Scripture and the Mystery of the Mother of God by Scott Hahn & Jr. Leon J. Suprenant

Author:Scott Hahn & Jr. Leon J. Suprenant
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub, pdf
Tags: Faith, Catholic, Christianity, Religion, Theology, General Fiction
ISBN: 9781931018234
Publisher: Emmaus Road Publishing
Published: 2002-06-01T06:00:00+00:00

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1 ^Cf. Scott Hahn, “The Mystery of the Family of God,” as published in Hahn and Suprenant, eds., Catholic for a Reason: Scripture and the Mystery of the Family of God (Steubenville, OH: Emmaus Road Publishing, 1998), 11.

2 ^Cf. C.S. Lewis, Mere Christianity (New York: Macmillan Publishing Co., 1952), 111.

CHAPTER IX

Mary,

Full of Grace

KIMBERLY HAHN

Of all of the obstacles littering my path toward the Catholic Church, none loomed larger than Mary. She represented diversion from true devotion to Our Lord to a plastic (or ceramic or marble) substitute. She was only the box that held the Present; did it honor the Giver to play with the box and ignore the Gift? Depending on which Catholic friend I spoke to, I heard qualities attributed to her that bordered on divinity, including titles such as Queen of Heaven and Mother of God. How could I reconcile the love for Jesus which I shared in common with Catholic brothers and sisters with the antagonism I felt toward Mary, His mother?

As my husband Scott shared his growing appreciation for the virgin mother of Jesus, I felt challenged to examine her role for the first time, apart from a prejudice against Catholic practices I did not understand. There had been a subconscious exclusion of Mary from my life of faith (except for a statue in the crèche my mother displayed at Christmas). Now I began an examination of the passages in Scripture describing Mary. Who was she? What did she do?

Fact: Mary was a young virgin, from David’s royal line, who loved God and wanted to serve Him faithfully.

Fact: God chose Mary to be the mother of His Son so that He would be her Savior and ours.

Fact: Mary responded “YES!” with her whole heart. She was willing to do the Father’s will, no matter the cost.

Fact: By the power of the Holy Spirit, the Second Person of the Godhead, the Son, took on human flesh within the womb of Mary, thereby becoming her Son as well as God’s Son. She was the channel through whom Jesus received human nature. And Jesus, as Son of God (fully God) and Son of Mary (fully man), was able to save us from sin.

Never before had I acknowledged Mary as my primary role model. Now I could see she had done what I wanted to do: respond immediately to God’s call. I had a new appreciation for the gift of this virgin’s “yes” to God—the gift of Jesus through her to me. Even so, I did not want to examine or come to terms with the claims of the Catholic Church about her. Not yet.

Scott, on the other hand, was reading widely in Catholic theology and beginning to practice some Catholic devotions, including the Rosary. Unbeknownst to me, he had “put God to the test” with the Rosary and believed the answered prayer should be shared with me. He spoke with enthusiasm; I could barely respond. I did not even know he had a rosary, let alone

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