Beginning the New Year with a Smile

Cause of our Joy

I will greatly rejoice in the Lord, my soul shall exult in my God; for he has clothed me with the garments of salvation, he has covered me with the robe of righteousness, as a bridegroom decks himself with a garland, and as a bride adorns herself with her jewels (Is 61:10).

The Church contemplates how Mary proclaims these words in the entrance antiphon of the solemnity of the Immaculate Conception. These words of the prophet Isaiah find their New Testament echo and confirmation in the Magnificat (Lk 1:46-55). Mary’s soul overflows with joy because she is full of grace. As the woman clothed with the sun, that is to say in intimate communion with the “Sun of Justice” (Mal 4:2) who is Christ, the Blessed Virgin overflows with joy. As the Mother who brings to us our Saviour, she is “Cause of our Joy”.

It is a beautiful thing to begin each year with the Solemnity of Mary Mother of God because in this way the first thing we experience on January 1 is the smile of Our Lady.

Her smile says it all

Benedict XVI contemplated the smile of Mary in his homily of September 15 ,2008, Memorial of Our Lady of Sorrows, at a Mass for the Sick celebrated at Lourdes as part of the one hundred and fiftieth anniversary celebrations of the apparitions:

In the course of the apparition of Wednesday 3 March 1858, Bernadette contemplated this smile of Mary in a most particular way. It was the first response that the Beautiful Lady gave to the young visionary who wanted to know who she was. Before introducing herself, some days later as “the Immaculate Conception,” Mary first taught Bernadette to know her smile, this being the most appropriate point of entry into the revelation of her mystery.

Why is Our Lady’s smile “the most appropriate point of entry into the revelation of her mystery”? Surely because Mary shows us what it means to be divinised by grace, raised to the dignity of being a child of God the Father, in Christ, by the working of the Holy Spirit. Mary’s smile reveals her identity, and also ours. “In the smile of the most eminent of all creatures, looking down on us, is reflected our dignity as children of God”, says Benedict.

The Blessed Mother’s smile reminds us of who God is and who we are. From this awareness, that of our divine filiation in Christ, flows the joy which will sustain us throughout the new year and throughout our entire life. As St Josemaría put it:

“Happy” – The question made me think. Words have not yet been invented to express all that one feels – in the heart and in the will – when one knows oneself to be a son of God” (Furrow 61).

Our Lady of Sorrows, and of the Resurrection

But what of suffering? How will we remain serene and joyful as we face the problems and difficulties that may well come our way in the new year? Mary too knows about suffering. We contemplate her at the foot of the Cross, suffering to a degree no one else has ever suffered. Her sensitivity of soul is greater than that of anyone else precisely because she is utterly without sin. Yet this suffering gives way to the overwhelming joy of the Resurrection. Mary truly shares in the Passion of Jesus. St Bernard declared that the Mother of Christ entered into the Passion of her Son through her “compassion”.

However as Benedict XVI reminded the multitude of sick people in Lourdes, “today Mary dwells in the joy of the Resurrection. The tears shed at the foot of the Cross have been transformed into a smile which nothing can wipe away.”

The Blessed Virgin teaches us how to suffer with faith in the ultimate and never ending joy of the Resurrection. As most-loving Mother she also accompanies and consoles us when we are finding things hard. Pope Benedict continued:

The smile of Mary is for all, but it is directed quite particularly to those who suffer, so that they can find comfort and solace therein. To seek Mary’s smile is not an act of devotional or outmoded sentimentality, but rather the proper expression of the living and profoundly human relationship which binds us to her whom Christ gave us as our Mother.… Within the smile of the Virgin lies mysteriously hidden the strength to fight against sickness and for life.

The simple and sublime joy of being Mary’s children

Our Lady brings us happiness above all and simply because she is our loving Mother. Gifted to us by Jesus from the Cross (cf. Jn 19:25-27), she never forgets her children, and desires only their happiness. Our Lady always smiles on us. “In the very simple manifestation of tenderness that we call a smile” says Benedict XVI, “we grasp that our sole wealth is the love God bears us, which passes through the heart of her who became our Mother.”

The holy Curé of Ars, St Jean Marie Vianney seems to speak from experience when he affirmed that “the heart of this good Mother is nothing but love and mercy. She wants nothing other than to see us happy. It is enough to simply turn towards her for our prayers to be answered.”

Mary and the joy of the Gospel

Mary’s smile is also a lesson in evangelisation. She is Queen of Apostles because she is the first one to bring the good news of salvation to others. Our everyday apostolate of seeking to share the beauty of Christ with others finds an unparalleled model in how Mary shares the joy of salvation. It is enough to contemplate the joyful event of the Visitation, as Pope St John Paul II points out:

The atmosphere that pervades the evangelical episode of the Visitation is joy: the mystery of the Visitation is a mystery of joy. John the Baptist exults with joy in the womb of St Elizabeth; the latter, rejoicing in the gift of motherhood, bursts out into blessings of the Lord; Mary pours forth the “Magnificat”, a hymn overflowing with Messianic joy. But what is the mysterious, hidden source of this joy? It is Jesus, whom Mary has already conceived thanks to the Holy Spirit, and who is already beginning to defeat what is the root of fear, anguish and sadness: sin, the most humiliating slavery for man (Homily, 31 May 1979).

The Holy Father Pope Francis constantly reminds us that our message is the “joy of the Gospel”. As we begin a new year, let us ask the Holy Spirit to help us imitate the example of the Blessed Virgin, who spreads the “joy of the Gospel” by her life and by her smile. Yes, there will be challenges ahead for sure. As Benedict XVI said at the start of his pontificate:

The task of the shepherd, the task of the fisher of men, can often seem wearisome. But it is beautiful and wonderful, because it is truly a service to joy, to God’s joy which longs to break into the world (Homily, 24 April 2005).

What matters is to seek to imitate Mary, the new “ark of the covenant”, by bringing Christ with us in all the ordinary circumstances of daily life, anywhere and everywhere, with anyone and everyone. From Our Lady’s smile we learn the truth of those words of encouragement from St Josemaría:

When you launch out into the apostolate, be convinced that it is always a question of making people happy, very happy: Truth is inseparable from true joy (Furrow 185).

A smile for everyone

“To seek this smile (of Mary), is first of all to have grasped the gratuitousness of love”, says Benedict XVI. The smile of the Mother of God is for everyone because God “desires all people to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth” (1 Tim 2:4). Hence in our apostolate we form friendships with all kinds of people and we seek to build bridges with everyone, even if we do not share some of their opinions or priorities, or if they seem to be or are distant from or antagonistic to the Church. May we have a smile for everyone, learn from everyone and offer Christ to everyone. We do not impose, but we propose constantly, because we want to be the continuation of God’s smile through history.

As we begin a new year as apostles of Jesus Christ, we may find it helpful to pray about the words of St Josemaria:

Every generation of Christians needs to redeem, to sanctify its own time. In order to do this, it must understand and share the desires of other men – one’s equals – in order to make known to them, with a gift of tongues, how they are to correspond to the action of the Holy Spirit, to that permanent outflow of rich treasures that comes from our Lord’s heart. We Christians are called upon to announce, in our own time, to this world to which we belong and in which we live, the message – old and at the same time new – of the Gospel.

It is not true that everyone today – in general – is closed or indifferent to what our Christian faith teaches about man’s being and destiny. It is not true that men in our time are turned only toward the things of this earth and have forgotten to look up to heaven. There is no lack of narrow ideologies, it is true, or of persons who maintain them. But in our time we find both great desires and base attitudes, heroism and cowardice, zeal and disenchantment: men who dream of a new world, more just and more human, and others who, discouraged perhaps by the failure of their youthful idealism, hide themselves in the selfishness of seeking only their own security or remaining immersed in their errors.

To all these men and women, wherever they may be, in their more exalted moments or in their crises and defeats, we have to bring the solemn and unequivocal message of St Peter in the days that followed Pentecost: Jesus is the cornerstone, the redeemer, the hope of our lives. “For there is no other name under heaven given to men by which we must be saved” (Acts 4:12) (Christ is passing by, 132-133).