Ordinary Time - Week 16c
Martha and Mary
(From Conversation with God, Fernandez Carvajal)Today's Gospel recounts the arrival of Jesus and his disciples at the house of their friends Martha, Mary and Lazarus in Bethany. On a later occasion, Jesus wept when he learned that Lazarus had died. Bethany lies about two miles from Jerusalem. Jesus would stop there to rest in the home of his friends before going on up to the holy city. He felt at home in that place, surrounded as he was by joy and affection. This is how we ought to welcome Jesus, who is in the Tabernacle. We have no more faithful friend than He. He deserves our loving attention more than anyone else.
In this warm family environment the sisters behaved with naturalness and simplicity, even as they revealed different attitudes. Martha was distracted with much serving. She seems to have been the elder of the two. She was completely taken up with the work of tending to the Lord and his disciples. Certainly, there would have been plenty to keep her occupied. To receive such a numerous group was no easy task, especially since they had arrived so unexpectedly. Understandably, Martha wants to welcome the Lord in an appropriate manner. We know that at a certain point she lost her equanimity and became frustrated due to her misreading of the situation. Mary, on the other hand, sat at the Lord's feet and listened to his teaching. Martha was distracted from her task of preparing the meal. In her eagerness to get the meal ready for the Lord, Martha becomes preoccupied by a million little details. Her sister Mary prefers instead to devote herself to their guest. She forgets about her sister and sits before him, doing nothing else but listen to his word. With the help of divine grace, we have to learn how to live a unity of life, which consists of the union of Martha's and Mary's attitudes. Our love of God should be inseparable from our apostolic zeal, and our work be well done for the glory of God.
For many centuries these two sisters have been held to represent two rival lifestyles. According to this traditional interpretation Mary exemplifies the way of contemplation, the life of union with God. Similarly, Martha is seen as the personification of an active life of work. But the contemplative life does not consist in simply being at the feet of Jesus doing nothing. That would be a disorder, if not pure and simple indolence. For we must find God in our daily job, transforming our professional work into the hinge on which our calling to sanctity rests and turns. We show our love for God through the exercise of the human as well as the supernatural virtues. It is very difficult, perhaps impossible, to have a deep interior life and at the same time live a vibrant apostolate if we lack a serious commitment to our daily work.