Mary’s listening and contemplative gaze

# The Attentive Listening of Mary: Meditation on the Heart (Lk 2:19), the Grotto of Bethlehem, and the Shepherds’ Visit in Faith Interpretation

To grasp the depth and breadth of Mary’s listening, we must descend to the Nativity grotto in Bethlehem and relive the shepherds’ visit to Jesus’ cradle.

The shepherds came and told many and wonderful things that had happened that night while they were watching their flocks: And all who heard were amazed at what the shepherds said (Lk 2:18).

Mary, in turn, kept all these things, meditating on them in her heart (Lk 2:19).

Here, Mary’s listening is meditation. To understand this attitude, it is important to know that ‘meditate’ translates a Greek verb that means to gather or bring together. Mary practiced meditation on the Sacred Scriptures and then meditated on everything, because she gathered in her heart all she heard and understood about God; thus, she united the word to the Word, knowledge to Knowledge, decision to Decision, love to Love.

In this way, the Mother of Jesus entered ever more deeply into the mystery of God and the understanding of His Word. All this work of meditation is marked by a profound discernment:

> Maria understands what to take and what to leave. We find this gift of hers precisely in the story of the Annunciation (Lk 2:26-38).

> Maria hears and sees truly extraordinary things. And she is a dedicated woman, a worshipper of the Lord. She feels called in grace. An angel assures her that the Lord is with her and that she has been chosen to be the mother of the Messiah who will sit on David’s throne. Yet Maria does not get carried away. One might say that all this does not go to her head, but rather she distances herself and puts the angel to the test: “How can this be? I do not know a man” (Lk 1:34). The angel responds to her precisely, giving her all the explanations she seeks, concluding that the one who will be born of her will be conceived by the intervention of the Holy Spirit. Then Maria closes her discernment, her meditation, responding to the angel: if it is a matter of consenting to the Holy Spirit, there is no problem, for she is the Lord’s servant. Then let what you yourself said come true in me!

> For Maria, this is not difficult: she immediately rebuilds everything from a single verse into an entire psalm, from a detail into the whole episode. And this because the Word of God is familiar to her. Meditating slowly, Maria grasps the Word of God: she conceives it in her heart and not just in her womb. The Mother of God cares about what is in the heart of the Son: Maria and Jesus share a deep understanding. Only thus can we understand the episode at the wedding in Cana, Jesus’ reaction to Mary’s news about the lack of wine.

> I believe that Maria did not accelerate the time of Jesus’ miracles, but rather, in her prophetic spirit, she saw them coming and therefore prepared everything so that the transformation of water into wine could be received as a moment of divine mercy. The miracle at the wedding in Cana reveals in a disconcerting way Mary’s prophetic spirit, deepened in Scripture and entirely oriented towards the revealing Word. In response to Jesus’ warning:

“My time has not yet come” (Jn 2:4)

# Mary’s Contemplative Gaze at the Cross: The Theory of Luke, Jo 19:25, and the Contemplation of Divine Agape Under the Cross

To understand Mary’s gaze, her ability to peer into the mystery of God’s love with faith-filled eyes, we must ascend with her to the **Calvary** at the foot of Jesus’ cross. Here, Mary sees what others do not: her prophetic gaze, piercing and discerning (Num 24:3), discerns the presence of each supreme manifestation of divine Agape.

Indeed, we read that:

> “All the crowds who had come to witness this event, remembering what had happened, were striking their breasts in sorrow. But Jesus’ friends and the women who had followed him from Galilee stood at a distance, watching everything” (Lk 23:48-49).

The fact of Jesus’ death is termed by Luke “theoria,” a Greek term of profound meaning: theoria was the supreme explanation of all things. Luke finds this universal explanation in the Cross. And with Luke, Mary too, who sees what others do not see, for her eyes are washed clean by tears and torn apart by pain.
To penetrate the mystery of God’s love with the gaze requires that the mystery first penetrate the gaze, softening the heart. Prayer offered through the gaze, both exterior and interior, flows from the supreme manifestation of God’s love for humanity. The Cross thus becomes the heart of contemplative life, as it is the place where Love pours itself out upon us. The Cross is the icon of God’s charity, the full gift of God’s love to humanity, according to a beautiful expression of Saint Maximos the Confessor. We can thus understand what the Second Council of Nicaea (787) affirms in its dogmatic definition when specifying the type of veneration reserved for sacred icons. According to our faith, it is not a true cult of latria, reserved only for the divine nature, but a cult akin to that offered to the image of the precious and life-giving Cross, the Holy Gospels, and other sacred objects, honoring them with incense and lights, as was customary among the ancients. The honor paid to the image is transferred to him whom it represents. And whoever venerates the image, venerates the person it depicts.
At this point, it seems clear that if we wish to grow in prayer, in contemplation of the mystery of the Cross, which is the throne of the Lamb around which the Church gathers, we must rediscover, perhaps rediscover, the iconographic tradition of the Church. There exists an iconography in both Eastern and Western Churches: the former is more representative and attains its most characteristic expression in painted (or written) icons. The latter is more abstract and finds its most expressive form in architecture (I refer primarily to Gothic).
Yet, unique opportunities still present themselves today: the cross, crucifix, paschal candle, altar—these are sacred images to be deciphered and internalized, which enter into liturgical action as holy images. Furthermore, there is a rediscovery of Latin and Byzantine icon art, offering a singular opportunity for prayer. However, to read these images requires a method; otherwise, one might end up in sentimentalism or entirely free attribution of meaning: something that does not favor wise contemplation in harmony with the living tradition of the Church and in harmony with the liturgy.
If an icon is understood, receiving its service as reference to an archetype, then it allows for divine lectio, with greater depth and clarity than a text from Sacred Scripture can offer. A positive method for reading icons can be concentrated on five operations: theme, narrative, stimulus, distance, and labyrinth.
Discovering the theme, even with the help of inscriptions, means identifying the biblical text to which the icon refers. Indeed, each icon must make visible, through drawing and color, what Scripture announces with words.
The theme is re-expressed in the icon using visual language. And this fact creates a kind of narrative, a sequence of images that make the icon an equivalent of the invisible reality it evokes and makes us believe.
The stimulus recalls the function of colors, for color is a psycho-emotional stimulant. A correct reading of the icon allows one to identify its central color and secondary colors, which harmonize like the notes in a musical piece. The chromatic aspect and its implicit symbolism are the cause of the therapeutic power of icons, capable of healing imagination and freeing it from the aggressiveness of perverse images.
However, we must also distance ourselves from chromatic stimuli, for man is not only imaginary (night), but also rationality (day). We are led to this operation through the discovery of the icon’s perigraf (the area around the main image) and its geometric and abstract symbolism below the surface.
Each icon has its own mystery, offers its own treasure beyond what is immediately seen. And this treasure suggests the labyrinth symbol, for reading the icon is like a path that leads precisely to the chamber of treasures, to heavenly Jerusalem, as in the labyrinths we find on the floors of certain ancient churches, traversed by penitents on their knees, on the way to the Holy Land.
Each icon is thus presented as a small iconostasis, concealing and revealing the mystery of faith to discerning eyes. It is like a labyrinth that must be walked slowly, on one’s knees, until we discover the point of radiation that burns our gaze, making us reflect with love on what is real but invisible. The fire that burns our gaze, internalized, illuminates the heart and warms prayer and contemplation.
If an icon does not burn our gaze, it remains a mere external surface, perhaps as beautiful that it can be looked at, until it becomes respectable. Thus would arise idolatry, an impious manipulation of the icon incapable of communicating the mystery contemplated. If the icon does not lead the contemplator to participate in the reality contemplated, it will be no more than an image representing a reality like a photograph of the past.
In Mary’s piercing gaze, we see iconography happening. Mary saw beyond colors, moments, voices, and entered into a mystery that was revealed, veiling itself and reading these marks of history that were being saved at every moment. The mystery is not outside us; we are inside it, and by looking at what surrounds us, we become aware of its presence. Thus was Mary’s path, in which the absolute transcendent before whom she covered her face because it could not be seen became man among us, touchable, reachable, but did not lose its mystery or the power of revelation. Now we have a history that saves, told in the continuous icon of life… that never stops flowing. Time to learn to read this icon by learning from Mary.

To deepen reflection on contemplative listening in Mary, consult the encyclical Redemptoris Mater by John Paul II, which presents Mary as a model of faith, listening, and spiritual pilgrimage.

Deepen your studies: explore Mariology, Marian Theology, Marian Apparitions and the Master’s in Mariology.