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Institute for Homiletics

A Collaboration of The Catholic Foundation and the University of Dallas

Immaculate Conception of the Blessed Virgin Mary

The Urge for Cleanliness

Sometimes a small thing can jolt a memory. I was startled one morning to discover that my COVID-19 bar of soap was gone. That brown-and-tan–striped soap bar had grown paper thin. I rubbed my hands together with it after breakfast and . . . it was gone.

For six weeks, I remember scrubbing my hands raw with that bar of soap. My hands had to be clean. Immaculate. Germ-free. The coronavirus with which I was infected must not pass on to my husband or to others. My hands had to be clean. Sterile. Spotless. It was urgent. It mattered.

Today, we celebrate that urgency for cleanness. Pure, true, immaculate—these are attributes of the Most Holy One. God is good. That statement sounds clichéd, but it is urgent. It matters: God is good. True. Pure. Holy . . . Good.

Since the earliest days of the church, the Incarnation has been urgent—that this good and holy God should become human? Oooh. With the people of faith throughout the centuries, we bow at that mystery. Who, then, was the young woman chosen to be God’s mother? It was urgent that she be made holy in order to house the Holy. The Mother of God had to be unstained from the beginning, clean and immaculate. Today we celebrate that. Mary is the new Eve, a startling counterpoint to the sordidness that has infected the human race. She is good. Clean. Pure.

That gives hope for you and me. God’s plan is to open the way of holiness to us as well. The viruses of life can pollute our lives. But the Spirit of God can fill us with the determination to grow toward goodness. We have to be holy. It is urgent. It matters. God is good. The pure of heart will see God. We want to see God. Come, Holy Spirit, Sanctifier, Purifier, scrub us clean!

Consider/Discuss

  • Sometimes the world feels dirty. Do you ever get tired of hearing lies and deceptions in the news, the planting of stories designed to sway you and public opinion? Where is wholesomeness? Where is goodness? Millions of dollars have gone into research into how to change people’s habits and minds. It can become manipulation. It can pollute us. Whom can we believe? In this Advent season, we seek to turn away from dirt, to be washed clean, to start anew. What is one concrete thing that we can do this week to make that happen?
  • When has God’s mercy freed you to see God present in your life?

Living and Praying with the Word

O Jesus, help us! You said, “Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God.” We want to be pure of heart. We want to see you. As we celebrate this day of purity, help us to think about our habits and our way of life. Transform us so that we can live more simply and more purely. You call us to holiness. You call us to wholesomeness. Cleanse us from the dirt that clings so closely. Turn us away from sin. We want to follow you, you who are good and holy and pure. Wash us so we that we live in a way that is close to you.

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Scripture Study for

The scriptures tell us that in the beginning God made a “good” world and when humans entered the scene, they were at first well integrated into this harmonious creation. Indeed, Genesis portrays the relationship between God and humans as unusually intimate and personal. It is only when the snake induces the humans to doubt God’s good will toward them that the relationship is ruptured. The effects cascade as the intimacy between humans is damaged (passing the blame) and then the relationship between humans and the earth also becomes disharmonious (it is now difficult to till the soil). This tale suggests that human ignorance gives rise to suspicion and then to division, the cause and the effects of human sin.

The Letter to the Ephesians begins with a blessing of God, which emphasizes that what God has done in Christ is not an accident or “add-on” to a human history gone wrong, but is in fact part of a divine plan “before the foundation of the world.” Humans, despite the sins they will commit, have been loved by God from before all creation and have been destined to be “adopted” as God’s children from the beginning. Even human sin cannot derail the plan “of the one who accomplishes all things” as intended. That God’s desires for all humanity cannot be undone by millennia of sin attests to the glory and power of God.

Gabriel’s greeting to Mary, rendered in our Lectionary as “full of grace” (from the Latin gratia plena), can also be understood as “highly favored one,” and indeed, the angel assures the young woman that she has found favor with God. This should be understood not as an indication that Mary has somehow earned God’s favor, but that she has been “favored by God,” in the sense that she has been given a special role in God’s plan (as was the case also for Israel and Moses, neither of whom could be said to have earned God’s favor; see Exodus 33:16). The passage makes it clear that it is God’s unmerited choice of Mary to fulfill a long-standing plan, “prepared” well before she was born.

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