The translation of today’s Gospel officially used in the US lectionary has today’s reading begin, “My soul proclaims the greatness of the Lord.” Other translations use the wording, “My soul MAGNIFIES the greatness of the Lord.” That phrase holds me today. What does it mean to MAGNIFY the greatness of the Lord? How could even Mary magnify the greatness of God? Magnify means to enlarge, enhance, increase, expand, amplify, intensify. How can any person do that?
An archaic meaning of magnify is “to proclaim,” and that is doubtless how we get some translations which say “magnify” and others which say “proclaim” for the beginning of Mary’s great Magnificat. But I am caught by the question, “Can a person enlarge, enhance, increase, expand, amplify, or intensify the greatness of God?
That is my prayer question for today. Brother Zachary Wilberding, OSB, a monk at St. Meinrad, taught us to ask Scripture a question when we pray. I don’t always do that, but today the question is center stage: Can a person magnify the greatness of God?
I remember a St. Mother Teresa story. Someone told Mother of a family of several children who had no food. She prepared some rice and went to the family. They were clearly in great need. But when receiving the food, the mother immediately divided it and disappeared. When she returned, Mother asked her, “Where did you go?” The woman answered, “To my neighbors who are Muslim. They also have no food.”
That story has moved me more than once, when I have something which I need (time to rest, money, even a good pot of soup) and I am presented with an opportunity to divide and share. That story has “magnified the Lord” in me by helping me identify my ever-too-ready human tendency to think of myself first—and sometimes only. It has magnified (expanded) God-within-me to overcome my selfishness.
The situation was inspiring to St. Mother Teresa. She told it frequently. How many others across the world has that story also inspired? How many of us have more of God-with-us, God-in-us, because of a simple act by an unknown woman who divided her rice.
God is more present in the world because of her combination of humble gratitude and generosity.
Humble gratitude and generosity. Hmm.
Humble because there was no sense of “I’m due this. God finally was faithful to me and took care of my need.” It was a simple act of receiving from God’s goodness that came through the person who told St. Teresa, through the person who provided her with the rice, and through her going to the woman. It was simple acceptance of the gift as gift—an act of humility.
Gratitude. The gift was accepted. There was no demurring, “Oh, you shouldn’t have come all this way to bring this” or “Only rice? No beans?” Thankfulness and acceptance of the gift.
Generosity. In effect the woman said, “I have been given to. Now I respond with giving.” This gift from God’s love was just naturally passed on in love to the next person, the next family, too.
I return to the Gospel. Mary hears from Gabriel that her cousin Elizabeth, who is older, past childbearing age, is also expecting. What is her response? The same as the woman who received the rice: she magnifies the greatness of the Lord as she “set out and traveled to the hill country in haste to a town of Judah where she entered the house of Zechariah and greeted Elizabeth.” (Luke 1:39)
She accepted the gift that God had chosen her to be the mother of Emmanuel, God-with-us. Once she had an explanation to “How can this be?” she simply said yes. Humility. Then generosity: she thought of the needs of her cousin Elizabeth. She went to stay with her until after Elizabeth safely gave birth.
The gratitude was then fully expressed in her great Magnificat: “My soul proclaims the greatness of the Lord. My spirit rejoices in God my savior, for he has looked upon his lowly servant, from this day all generations will call me blessed; the Almighty has done great things for me, and holy is his Name.”
This prayer is said every day in the Church throughout the world as the ending of Evening Prayer in the Liturgy of the Hours. How many times it has enabled me to exalt, to rejoice in some goodness that God has done to me or through me during the day! We often sing John Michael Talbot’s version of the Magnifcat, Holy Is His Name, in our prayer group. Mary’s exaltation has magnified my awareness of God’s goodness to me many, many times. As I have used her words, God did not become greater, but He became greater to me, within me. I better recognized his greatness.
And her choice to visit Elizabeth reminds me to reach out to others every time I pray the Visitation in the rosary. How many others have been inspired by that action? How many million times through the centuries have people reached out in hospitality and help from that inspiration—and thus magnified the Lord?
In the first reading and the Psalm today Hannah also magnifies the greatness of the Lord with her humility, gratitude, and generosity. She had prayed for a child in the temple on her family’s yearly journey there. God had answered her prayer. He gave her the child Samuel—who became the prophet who eventually anointed David King of Israel. With humility and gratitude she gave the child back to God—a tremendous act of generosity.
Her words in the Psalm certainly magnify God as Hannah says almost the same words as Mary, “My heart exults in the Lord, my horn is exalted in my God. I have swallowed up my enemies; I rejoice in my victory…The Lord makes poor and makes rich, he humbles, he also exalts. He raises the needy from the dust; from the dung heap he lifts up the poor.”
How God was expanded, enlarged, enhanced, increased, amplified, and intensified by the prophecies and actions of Samuel! Samuel was a key player in the development of the Kingdom of Israel…which was the forerunner of the Kingdom of God—established by Mary’s son.
So, what does this mean for me? What does it mean for you, today, in 2016?
The meaning for me is that I cannot create the greatness of God, but I can magnify it. I can expand, enlarge, enhance, increase, amplify, and intensify God’s greatness. I can do that today.
I can receive with humility and gratitude. Then with generosity I can pass on. What I do may be as simple as sharing some food, like the woman in Mother Teresa’s story. It may be a serious effort to reach out to others, like Mary as she went to be with Elizabeth. It may be a great sacrifice, like Hannah as she gave her child to the priest Eli.
As I look at my day, I can’t see anything I am likely to do that in itself would magnify the Lord: I will work this morning, clean and cook this afternoon, and tonight participate in a parish posada with our Latino community.
But my prayer tells me that if I do those very ordinary things with humility, gratitude, and generosity, I will give God the opportunity to be magnified and proclaimed. His Kingdom could come a bit more in this little corner of the world.
My job is just to be open to let God’s greatness through.
Prayer:
Oh Lord, today give me the humility, gratitude, and generosity to let Your greatness pass through me. Let my soul proclaim the greatness of the Lord. Let me exalt in God my Savior. Amen.
Link to readings: 1 Samuel 1: 24-28; 1 Samuel 2: 1, 4-5, 6-7; Luke 1: 46-50.
And may Emmanuel come to be with you and in you this Christmas!
