The Word of God has an amazing newness. Not that it changes or mutates, or is constantly being added to. But the way in which the Word of God in a precise moment interacts with a specific situation and impacts the lives of particular people gives it a quality of prophetic newness that is never exhausted. This takes place above all in the liturgy of the Church when the People of God hear His word to them for this particular moment in their lives. The Second Vatican Council in its Constitution on the Sacred Liturgy, Sacrosanctum Concilium, teaches that Christ, “is present in His word, since it is He Himself who speaks when the holy scriptures are read in the Church,” (n. 7).
October 13 is the anniversary of the last of the apparitions of the Virgin Mary in 1917 to three Portuguese shepherd children in Fatima. On this particular occasion, as had been promised, a miraculous sign was given to the more than 40,000 people who were present. At a particular moment the clouds, from which a steady rain had been falling, cleared. The sun then not only came out, but “danced” in the sky, and at one point seemed to be headed straight down on a collision course with the earth. When the amazing phenomenon, which was seen from miles away, was over, the previously soaked crowd was dry. In the year 2000, then Cardinal Ratzinger shared with the world the text of the famous Third Secret of Fatima, confided to Lucia – the eldest and longest surviving of the visionaries, offering an interpretation in light of significant events in the life of the Church in the previous century. How does the Word of God for today’s Mass resound against the backdrop of such an event?
In the First Reading from Galatians, St. Paul offers an allegorical interpretation of the story of Abraham, Hagar and Sarah, to explain the difference between the Old and the New Covenant, and states very beautifully: “The Jerusalem on high is free, and it is she who is our mother,” (4:26). On a feast of Our Lady who was completely free from sin, completely free to love, and who helps us to grow in authentic freedom, it is hard not to associate her with that remark. Nor is this association completely unfounded. St. Paul had just made reference to Mary 22 verses earlier in the same chapter (“God sent forth His Son, born of a woman…”), and it is he himself in today’s passage who authorizes an allegorical interpretation of the Scriptures. Pope Benedict XVI as Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger wrote an excellent little book entitled Daughter Zion, in which he explains and argues for a typological association of the Virgin Mary with the image of Jerusalem or Zion in the messianic prophecies especially of later Isaiah.
The Gospel (Luke 11:29-32) focuses on the figure of Jonah, and at first glance seems to be at odds with the events of Fatima when Jesus says: “This is a wicked generation; it is asking for a sign. The only sign that will be given it is the sign of Jonah.” And yet, “signs” formed an integral part of Jesus ministry, inviting those who experienced them to believe in Him. The miracle of the sun at Fatima falls into this category. Miraculous signs become problematic, though, when they are demanded according to very specific criteria by those who are stubbornly incredulous. Jesus refuses to play those kinds of games, and goes to the heart of the matter by pointing to Himself, the Son of Man, as the Sign of Jonah for that generation (and every subsequent generation). He, in His Person, is the only one who corresponds to the deepest needs and criteria of the human heart, and so points out and is the way of salvation. Those who are stubborn in their unbelief need the conversion and repentance preached by Jonah more than the spiritual special effects they demand of Jesus.
Conversion, more than miraculous signs, is at the heart of the enduring message of Fatima, and in this it is in complete accord with the Gospel. The apparitions of Our Lady in Portugal, miracle of the sun and the famous Third Secret all have as their goal the opening of the human heart in faith and its turning from darkness of sin to the light of Christ. Like the Queen of the South (and who can hear the word “queen” on a feast of Mary without thinking of her?), Mary too will rise up on Judgement Day, not – I believe – to condemn, but to remind us not only of the sign of the sun at Fatima, but more importantly to point to the Sign of her Son, and to advocate for those who sought her spiritual assistance on the way to salvation. After all, if on Judgement Day – according to the words of Jesus – one queen can rise up to condemn, cannot a “greater” Queen (the mother of “someone greater” than Solomon and Jonah, the King and Judge Himself) rise up to defend?
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