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Homily (Reflection) for the Memorial of the Presentation of the Blessed Virgin Mary (21st November, 2016) on the Gospel and the Memorial
 

Rev 14:1-5;
Ps 23:1-6. (R. cf. v.6);
Lk 21:1-4.

Mary’s presentation was celebrated in Jerusalem in the sixth century. The Eastern Church was more interested in the feast, but it does appear in the West in the 11th century. Although the feast at times disappeared from the calendar, in the 16th century it became a feast of the universal Church. As with Mary’s birth, we read of Mary’s presentation in the temple only in apocryphal literature. In what is recognized as an unhistorical account, the Protoevangelium of James tells us that Anna and Joachim offered Mary to God in the Temple when she was 3 years old. This was to carry out a promise made to God when Anna was still childless.[1]
Topic: Offered to God.
Jesus saw rich people putting their gifts into the treasury and also a poor widow who put in two small copper coins. And He said,
Truly I tell you, this poor widow has put in more than all of them; for all of them have contributed out of their abundance, but she out of her poverty has put in all she had to live on.
But what moved this poor widow into this heroine act, giving all she had to live on? She must have understood “that the LORD is God! It is he that made us, and we are his; we are his people, and the sheep of his pasture” (Ps 100:3). Although we are not to lazy about (cf. 2Thess 3:10) but we must remember always that God takes care of all His creatures. Hence, Jesus asks us not to worry about anything because no one can add a single hour to his/her life span through worrying, cf. Matt 6:25, 27.
The memorial of the presentation of the Blessed Virgin Mary ought to reawaken in us the necessity to offer ourselves entirely to God. Our lives ought to be in line with Saint Paul’s letter to the Romans, “If we live, we live to the Lord, and if we die, we die to the Lord; so then, whether we live or whether we die, we are the Lord’s” (Rom 14:8).
Bible Reading: 2Cor 8:1-15.
Thought for today: We are God’s.
Let us pray: Lord, with the voice of thanksgiving I will sacrifice to you and what I have vowed I will pay – Amen (cf. Jon 2:9).
Blessed Virgin Mary – Pray for us.

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