Under the maternal wings, the armor of God and Herod’s fox

By Prof. Dr. Daniel C. Afonso · Updated 8 October 2026

Jerusalem, Jerusalem, thou that killest the prophets, and stonest them which are sent unto thee, how often have I desired to gather thy children together, as a hen doth gather her brood under her wings, and thou wouldest not?
Lk 13:34

The liturgy of the thirty-third week in Ordinary Time presents us with two images that seem at odds, but faith recognizes them as one. On one hand, the Apostle arms the faithful with God’s armor and sends them into battle against the powers of darkness. On the other, the Lord walks resolutely toward Jerusalem, weeping over the city that kills its prophets, extending over it the gesture of a bird gathering its young under its wings. The readings from Ephesians 6:10-20 and Luke 13:31-35 do not contradict each other. They describe, in two distinct grammatical forms, the same battle and the same tenderness. The warrior clad in righteousness and the hen sheltering her chicks are figures of the single mystery of salvation, which protects while it gathers.

I. The armor that is not of man

The opening move of the letter is a command for strength that does not spring from the faithful themselves.Confortamini in Domino, et in potentia virtutis ejus“Be strong in the Lord and in the strength of his might” (Eph 6:10). The strength asked of the Christian is participated, not possessed. Paul immediately shifts the battlefield from the flesh to the spiritual realm.Non est nobis colluctatio adversus carnem et sanguinem

“For we do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against the principalities, against the powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this age (Eph 6:12). The Christian struggle has not as its adversary the brother, but the invisible power that arms one brother against another. He who confuses the two fields has already lost the battle before engaging in it.”

“The armor that the Apostle describes is entirely defensive, save for one piece. The belt of truth, the armor of justice, the sandals of evangelical readiness, the shield of faith, the helmet of salvation, all protect the body from another’s strike. Only one weapon inflicts harm, and that is…”

gladium spiritus, quod est verbum Dei“The sword of the spirit, that is, the Word of God” (Eph 6:17). The Christian does not wield his own sword. The only sword entrusted to him is the Word that comes from God’s mouth. “The faithful resists with his body and inflicts only with truth.” That is why the text ends in prayer and supplication,per omnem orationem et obsecrationem orantes omni temporeEph 6:18, and Paul, a prisoner bound in chains, asks for prayers that his message may be effectively communicated. The armor culminates at the knee bent.

II. The Prophet Ascending to Jerusalem

The Gospel opens with an ambiguous warning. Some Pharisees inform Jesus that Herodes wants to kill you (Lk 13:31). The Lord’s response is not flight but journey. Go tell that fox, he says (Lk 13:32), that he drives out demons and performs healings today and tomorrow, and on the third day he will be perfected. The verb consummor, “I will complete,” “I will be perfected,” does not refer to the end of a to-do list. It points to Easter. The Lucan triduum of “today, tomorrow, and the day after” is the cipher for the path that leads to the cross and resurrection. Herod is a fox, cunning without royalty, and the fox does not hold back him who walks to his hour.

Follows the lament. It is not right that a prophet should perish outside of Jerusalem (Lk 13:33). The holy city, which should welcome the sent ones, has become the place where they die stoned. And then the maternal image breaks through. How many times have I wanted to gather your children, like a hen gathers her chicks under her wings, and you would not (Lk 13:34). God’s desire clashes with man’s unwillingness. Divine tenderness is offered, never imposed. The house is left desolate, and the final word is a suspended promise.

Non videbitis me donec veniat cum dicetis: Benedictus qui venit in nomine Domini

(Lk 13:35). The Lord will only be seen when He is blessed at the door.

III. One hand that protects and collects

The two readings converge on the figure of protection. Paul arms the faithful with a shield to withstand in die malo, «in the evil day» (Eph 6:13). Luke shows the Lord wanting to cover Jerusalem’s children with His wings. It is the same gesture contemplated from two sides. The armor is the protection the faithful wear. The wings are the protection God extends. Between the armor and the feather lies a single intent, to shield the small from the blow of evil. And there is a single condition, consent. The armor must be put on, induite vos, «put on» (Eph 6:11). The wings must be accepted, and Jerusalem refused.

Here lies the theological nerve of the day. Spiritual combat is not the solitary conquest of heroes, and grace is not a force that dispenses freedom. God arms the faithful and collects them, but He does not force them. The fox kills the prophets because the city refused the wings. The rejected tenderness becomes a deserted house. Jesus’ consummation on the third day, His consummor, is precisely God’s response to that refusal. Where man did not want to be collected, the Lord enters the city that kills Him and makes His own death the final nest. The cross is the extended wing that no one can close.

IV. Mary, the woman clothed and the wings offered

Tradition read in the collecting bird a figure of God’s maternal love, and Mariology recognizes in that love the concrete face of Mary. When the Johannine Apocalypse describes the woman given al&aelig. Du&aelig. Aquil&aelig. Magn&aelig., «two wings of a great eagle» (Rev 12:14), to escape the dragon, the Church contemplates one who, clothed in the sun, is both protected and protective. The armor of Eph 6 finds its perfect realization in Mary. She is the armor of justice because she generated the Just. She is the shield of faith because she believed when Jerusalem refused. Beata qu&aelig. Credidisti, «blessed art thou who believed» (Lk 1:45), says Elizabeth, and that faith is the shield that quells the arrows of evil.

Mary is not named in today’s readings, yet she is at their center. In the lament over Jerusalem, the Lord desires to collect the children under His wings, and the Mother standing at the cross receives that desire fulfilled when she hears Ecce mater tua, «behold thy mother» (Jn 19:27). What the city refused, the Virgin welcomed for all. She is the consent that was lacking in Jerusalem, the fiat that opens the deserted house. Therefore, Christian devotion invokes her as a refuge, and under her mantle, she recognizes the wings that Jesus desired to extend. Whoever takes refuge in Mary is already under God’s wings. The armor we are commanded to wear and the wings God offers have, in the end, the same maternal name, and it is under this name that the faithful resist in the evil day and walk, with the Lord, towards Jerusalem where the prophet is consumed and resurrected.