Lessons 7-9 from the Divine Office for Seven Holy Brethren and Saints Rufina and Secunda: A Homily by St. Gregory the Pope, Homily 3 in Evangelia

Lessons 7-9 from the Divine Office for Seven Holy Brethren and Saints Rufina and Secunda: A Homily by St. Gregory the Pope, Homily 3 in Evangelia

.

Dearly beloved brethren: The holy Gospel which is read this day is but very short, but it is heavy with great mysteries. Here Jesus, our Maker and Redeemer, feigneth himself as though he knew not his own Mother, and telleth who they be who are his mother and brethren, not by fleshly kinship, but by kinship of mind. Who is my Mother? And who are my brethren? Whosoever shall do the will of my Father, which is in heaven, the same is my brother, and sister, and mother. By the which words, what are we to understand, save that he gathereth together from out of Heathendom many that are willing to obey his commandments, and that he knoweth not Jewry, whereof, according to the flesh, he is a son.

Seeing that both men and women are called to the faith, we marvel not that he saith that whosoever shall do the will of his Father, the same is his brother, and sister. But it is startling to hear that the same is also his mother. His faithful disciples he is pleased to call his brethren, where he saith: Go, tell my brethren. If then it is by joining his religion that one can become the brother of the Lord, let us see how one can become his mother.

But we must know that even as one becometh his brother or his sister by believing in him, so one becometh his mother by preaching him. Such an one, as it were, giveth birth to the Lord by causing him to be in the hearer's heart, and by words giving his love existence in their neighbour's mind. For an example in point, behold blessed Felicity, whose Birth-day we keep today. She was one whose faith made her Christ's hand-maiden, and whose preaching made her Christ's mother. We read in the corrected edition of her Acts that she dreaded as much to leave her seven sons behind her alive in the flesh, as do worldly mothers to send theirs dead before them.