Saturday 28 June 2025
Immaculate Heart of Mary or St Irenaeus
Genesis 18:1-15. The Lord has remembered his mercy – Luke 1:46-50, 53-55. Matthew 8:5-17.
Be perfect in our love
Today’s Gospel is one of my favourites. I don’t know why that is. I often wonder what it must have been like for Mary and Joseph to be parents of the son of God.
I know what it is like to have children who are different from others. Who are deeply interested in specific subjects, who can be driven by single-minded purpose and, yes, who have the tendency to abscond sometimes. I feel such solidarity with Mary’s experience in today’s Gospel Reading. Even Mary, our holy mother, had hard days as a parent.
And this got me thinking. How often do we confuse the call to holiness with the holier-than-thou expectations placed on modern parents? These pressures to be faultless in all areas of child-rearing and housekeeping do not come from God. They come from advertisers. Instead, we are called to be perfect in our love.
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