The Wedding at Cana- Paolo Veronese (1528-1588)
Have
you been to any really good weddings lately?
Chances are you have not, at least according to the U.S. Census Bureau’s 2012
American Community Survey. According to
that survey, Rhode Island was third from the bottom in the entire country on
the percentage of married couples. We
are the most Catholic state in the nation, per capita, and yet we rank 48 out
of the 50 states when it comes to people choosing to marry. That is not a very encouraging statistic, and
while the situation seems somewhat dire, we can come back to that.
For now let us look at our
Gospel for tonight’s Novena Mass, The Wedding Feast at Cana. Now there was a situation that was dire! This young couple had gathered all their
family and friends to celebrate their union together. They even had Christ, the Blessed Virgin Mary
and the first Christian disciples. Quite
a “who’s who” for tying the knot! But
suddenly the entire event is about to take a turn for the worse when the wine
starts running low. Imagine a great
Italian wedding when the wine runs out. Quando il vino é finito, la festa é finita! When the wine runs out the feast is
over!
Weddings in Palestine at the
time of Christ would usually take place over the course of several days; they
were a major cultural event. Without any
more wine it would have ended in a disaster, and yet almost no one noticed that
impending crisis… except the Blessed Virgin Mary. Our Blessed Mother, Maria Santissima della
Civita, always notices us and intercedes for our needs. Whatever our circumstances here tonight or
whatever the needs are that concern us, Mary sees us; the Blessed Mother brings
our needs to Christ.
They have no wine.
—John 2:3
Our Lady brings the needs of
that newly married couple to the attention of Jesus and, as we well know, He
changes the water into wine. Christ
reveals Himself in this, His first miracle, the first sign announcing that He
is the Messiah, the Christ of God. St.
John tells us that here, “his disciples
began to believe in him” (John 2:11). What had started out as a dire situation
becomes, with the intercession of Our Lady, a tremendous outpouring of Divine
grace.
But St. John the Evangelist
is communicating so much more than even the miraculous power of Christ. He tells us that the water was originally
contained in six stone jars that were used “for
Jewish ceremonial washings” (John 2:6). These
ceremonial jars are reminiscent of the old covenant, the way of relating with
God established by the Mosaic Law. Central
to that law was the sacrificial dispensation, the offering up of bulls, goats
and lambs in atonement for sins and in thanksgiving to the God who saves. The sacrifices offered up by the priest were
central to the way the people related to God.
Jesus Christ comes to
establish an entirely New Covenant, written not in the Mosaic Law and in the
blood of bulls and lambs but established on the altar of the cross and written
in His own blood, shed for love of us. Christ
changes the water into wine, revealing that as wine is so much more substantial
than water, even so the New Covenant is the super substantial and eternal covenant
in which we have become united to the living God. Now that
is a miracle to behold!
Christ will pour out His
love for us from the cross, offering His body and His precious blood for the
forgiveness of our sins and to establish an eternal covenant with God. On the night before He dies He institutes the
sacrament of this self-offering in the Eucharist, the bread and wine that
becomes the Body and the Blood of Christ.
In all of the Sacraments of the Church, Christ will give new life, new
vitality, new hope. This is the water
changed into wine and distributed to the Church down through the
centuries!
But how sad, that in our
time and in the culture we live in, there is a turning away from the Sacraments
of the Church. God’s people no longer
come as frequently to His feast to partake of the wine that is life in Jesus
Christ.
- Rhode Island is third from the last in percentage of marriages celebrated in the United States. What a dire situation, that in the most Catholic state in the country the most foundational relationship and union for the transmission of the Gospel is found wanting.
- Holy Orders finds a parallel to Marriage in this same regard. This year the Diocese of Providence has not ordained a single man to the priesthood. Now, to be clear, we have 21 outstanding men studying for the priesthood of Jesus Christ for the Diocese of Providence. These men, in a few short years, will be doing great priestly ministry in our parishes. We are doing better than many dioceses and we thank God for each one of these fine men. Yet without a single ordination in the year 2014, the Lord would call our attention to the need for prayer and sacrifice so that those whom God is calling to the priesthood even now will have the grace and the courage to say, “Yes.”
- The Eucharist. Fewer Catholics are seeking the Lord in the Sacrament of the Eucharist on Sundays. Mass attendance is down in many places as the radical secularization of our culture continues to have a profound effect on the religious fervor and priorities of those who consider themselves to be Catholic.
- The Sacrament of Reconciliation. Every priest will tell you how remarkably beautiful it is to bring God’s forgiveness to those who seek Him. Yet every priest could also tell you of how many times he has sat alone in the confessional reading or praying the rosary, waiting for souls to come to God for that forgiveness. So few practicing Catholics today acknowledge the need even to receive forgiveness for grave sins, so few seek out that absolution, that restoration of new life for the soul.
These are signs of our
culture’s radical secularization, a world in which people find themselves bored
with the things of God, the very things which should be sustaining them and
giving them new life. They seek it
elsewhere, in television and on the internet, in distractions of a thousand different
kinds, and yet they find themselves dissatisfied, disappointed and unfulfilled.
They have no wine!
However dire the situation
might seem from a faith perspective, we can count on the Blessed Virgin Mary to
notice our needs, and in her love for us she brings those needs to Christ. They have no wine, Jesus! They have no vitality! They do not have what they need most of all,
because, Jesus, my Son, they do not have you!
Friends in Christ, if we do
not find vitality in the Body and the Blood of Christ then we will not find
vitality at all! If we do not find love
and new life in the Sacrament of Matrimony then we will not find love and new
life at all! If we do not find
satisfaction and hope in the Sacrament of Reconciliation with God then we
simply will not find satisfaction and hope at all!
We need God. We need Jesus Christ. We need more wine! The Blessed Virgin Mary knows what we need,
and she calls out to us especially now to turn once again to Jesus Christ so
that we can receive it.
If you have ever been to the
Louvre in Paris, France then you probably know that one of the most popular pieces in
that museum is the Mona Lisa. Painted in
the early Sixteenth Century by Leonardo da Vinci, it is one of the most famous works of art in the
world. It is also one of the
smallest. People that neither know nor
care for art in general will flock to that little painting because our culture
has told them, “If you go to the Louvre, then you’ve got to see the Mona Lisa.” They will stand in that enormous room, shoulder-to-shoulder,
just to snap a picture of that painting with their smartphone.
Yet if you are standing in
the midst of that crowd of people, looking at the Mona Lisa, and suddenly
turn 180° you will find, covering
the entire length of the back wall of that room, the largest painting in the Louvre.
It is an enormous Sixteenth Century piece, called "The Wedding at Cana" by
Paolo Veronese. It is breathtaking in
size, beauty and in its detailed depiction of that miracle we listened to in
our Gospel this evening. Unfortunately, few people in
that museum turn around from the Mona Lisa to look at it.
Our Lady calls out to us today, like she does in every
age, to turn around. She intercedes for us so that we might turn
away from the things that distract us and keep us from fulfillment, and turn towards
the Sacraments and the source of vitality that comes to us in the person of Jesus
Christ. May we drink deeply of that wine
and truly experience that abundant life flowing from the cross on Calvary and
leading us headlong into the Kingdom of God.
