Mary's Motherhood Through the Lens of Christ's Miracles

When the beloved disciple of Christ remembered the first miracle in Cana, he must have relived a depth that he once glimpsed but never grasped. This never-grasping the total mystery of Christ is not an experience of injustice, but quite totally the opposite: it is the fundamental human experience of absolute freedom and longing that Christ grants to those whom He has graciously embraced. It is understanding that grace and the human heart can coexist without one eliminating the other. It is the experience of everyone who has encountered Christ, an experience that no human effort or prayer can achieve unless God, in His sheer desire to radiate Himself, suddenly fulfills the promises that have been made in creation and in history. Christ is someone who is near and distant at the same time, someone who fulfills and dwells within the whole being of the person and yet is totally other. He is immanent while transcendent, outside of one’s own reach, yet a boundless, healing embrace.

So when the beloved disciple looked back at the miracle in Cana, he saw a new familiarity that he sought, felt, and glimpsed, but could have never imagined. The miracle was similar to two other miracles he would witness: the healing of the royal official’s son and the raising of Lazarus. They all follow a similar pattern:

1. There is someone who asks Jesus for a miracle
2. Jesus does not fulfill the petition
3. And yet, the person insists that Jesus perform a miracle
4. Jesus responds with a superabundant generosity that exceeds the expectations of the petitioner

In the second miracle story in Cana, there was a royal official whose son was very ill. When he heard that Jesus was near, he went to Jesus to ask Him to come with him to heal his dying son. Jesus does not come with him. This does not frustrate the desire of the loving father. He insists: “Sir, come down before my child dies.” At this point, Jesus does not budge. He does not come with him. And yet, he says, “You may go; your son will live.” The superabundant generosity of Jesus fills the physical distance between Him and the dying child. Distance is not a barrier to His tenderness, but in His own space and in His own time, He fulfills the will of His Father, which is the salvation of the broken world.

The same can be said of raising Lazarus from the dead. When Lazarus was dying, Martha and Mary sent word to Jesus about His beloved friend asking Him to perform a miracle. Jesus does not submit to their request: He lets him die and even permits his burial. Again: He works in His own space and in His own time, obedient to His Father. When He goes to see Lazarus, Martha, in her complete trust in Christ, tells Him to do the will of the Father. Filled with tears, Mary sorrowfully expresses the abandonment she felt when Jesus did not fulfill her requests. Lazarus was not like other people Jesus cured, even those who were “ill” or dead: he was not near death, nor had he recently died. He had been dead for four days. Yet, in His superabundant generosity, Jesus, not bound by time, gives life back to him. Time does not limit His tenderness. It is love that creates and increases time because love is patient. It is the excess and superabundance of love that makes life not tragic.

What affection must the disciple have in his heart when he made sense of his memory of the first miracle in Cana. After living with Him, following Him and suffering with Him, reliving the memory of closeness and distance of Jesus, he knew, within the deepest depth of his heart, that Jesus was always like this even in the beginning.

At the wedding in Cana, they were running out of wine. The wine represents wine at harvest time, a joyful ending after a long wait. The prophets in the Old Testament used this imagery to speak of an eschaton, of the “final days” when God would recreate His people (Amos 9:13-14, Jer. 31: 12-14). It is a moment of closeness with God, a closeness that reverses the awful slavery of sinfulness. There is a particular paradox in this story. The wedding represents a beginning (their marriage), but it also represents the fruit of an end (wine at harvest time, the joy between God and Israel at the wedding banquet). When the wine, that is to say, joy, ran short, Mary intercedes: “They have no wine.” Mary intercedes for the joy of humanity.

Christ distances Himself from the biological motherhood of Mary, renaming her “woman”: “Woman, how does your concern affect Me? My hour has not come.” “My hour has not come,” which is to say, Christ obeys the Father more than He obeys Mary. And just like Jesus renamed Simon, he renames Mary with the title of “Woman.” Mary has now been given a new task, a new mission. This apparent distance from the biological motherhood of Mary creates a space in her to intercede more fully for the humanity of the world. Mary accepts this new mission, this new task, and turns away from Jesus. The space that Christ gave to Mary allows her to create a distance between herself and her Son. Yet, this distance actually reveals the depth, the intimacy, between Mary and Jesus.

It is like a mother who has been told by her child to look at the drawing that he has made. The mother turns away her gaze from her child and looks at the drawing. This turning away affirms the creative devotion of the child: she is present to the child because she looks at the drawing. We can say that the mother is in the gaze of the child more fully because she is looking at the drawing. So too Mary turns away from Jesus to look at the servants, to intercede more fully for humanity. The acceptance of this distance from her biological motherhood allows her to become the new Eve, the Icon of the Church. She creates a distance between herself and her Son: “Do whatever He tells you.” And this distance creates the relationship between Christ and the servants. Mary turns away, creates a space, so that the servants can speak to Christ. She “lets go” of her physical motherhood, her intimate relationship with Christ, to create a relationship between Christ and the servants. This distance allows Christ’s superabundance to be revealed: the wine overflowed. The headwaiter then says to the silent bridegroom, “Everyone serves good wine first… But you have kept the good wine [not just quantity, but quality!] until now.” “Until now,” that is to say, the closeness between God and His bride has finally been established. The distance that Mary created then gives space for the bride to come.

The wedding of Cana is an interpretive key to understanding the Cross. The symbolic nature of the event in Cana is what allows one to contemplate the glory revealed on the Cross when blood and water flowed from Jesus’ heart. It is the superabundance of wine at the wedding of Cana that allows one to understand the depth and generous love the Father has for the world. These two events dwell within each other. Just like at the wedding of Cana, the crucified Jesus tells Mary again to turn away her gaze from her beloved Son and to look at the beloved disciple: “Woman, behold your son.” He creates a distance once again. Mary had to learn what it means to be a mother from her own Son. Not only does she let Christ suffer and die a shameful death, but she receives a further distance, and her attitude is that of obedience: “Behold, your son.” Her task was to accept the mission her Son gave her and in being led by her newborn son, the beloved disciple, she became completely one with the will of her Son. She let herself be taken into the home of her newborn son because she wanted what the Son wanted: the creation of the Church, the salvation of man. And Mary became the Icon, the Mother of the Church. What seemed to be a negation of the angel’s promise at the Annunciation becomes the fruitfulness of suffering and love. She let her beloved Son suffer and, in her obedience, the bride of Christ was born.