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STABAT, THE STAYING - GOING OF MARY
In August we celebrate one of the major solemnities dedicated to Mary. Let’s try to approach her figure in the “Made in Loppiano” style.
It is not easy to talk about Mary. On the one hand, we do not want to fall into the trap of sweet simplifications, on the other hand we do not even want to take for granted the courage with which she has carried out her task: the Mother of the one who have also created herself. What is Mary’s attitude that, especially in recent months, can help us? Her STABAT.
The STABAT MATER usually represents, in iconography, the Mary under the cross. But if we take it as the philosophy of life of someone who knows how to take reality as it is, the STABAT becomes a FIAT, a yes pronounced many times in the face of more or less pleasant circumstances.
This attitude is valid for each of us!
She says "yes" before something happens
“I am the Lord’s servant,” Mary answered. “May your word to me be fulfilled” (Lk 1,38).
Don’t we happen to want to avoid jobs whose results we are not sure of? A difficult contract to sign or a difficult decision to make? Maria is not that she did not fear what would happen next, but she said yes and managed to stand up to the most “scandalous” proposal in the history of humanity.
She says "yes" before she sees
In those days Mary got up and went quickly to the mountainous region, to a city of Judah. Entering the house of Zechariah, she greeted Elizabeth (Lk 1: 39-40).
The difficulty or suffering of the other touches us much more when we see it. The shopping to do for someone who cannot move from home due to illness, or a Saturday visit to someone who cannot clean his/her home, overwhelmed by so many work commitments. Concrete help to someone who is in difficulty is the way of saying yes, as Mary did.
She says "yes" before she understands
Her mother said to him: “Son, why did you do this to us? Behold, your father and I have been looking for you in anguish ”(Lk 2:48).
Sometimes, however, the situations we live in are so confused, that we really can’t understand anything. Here everyone could think of some periods of life (symbolically the three days of the loss of Jesus) in which problems of various kinds, instead of being resolved, multiply and it seems that there is no way out, from a dark tunnel. Mary’s question would be legitimate in the mouth of those who experience such confusion on various fronts. Not giving up when nothing goes is the STABAT and / or FIAT.
