Our Patroness, St. Mary, Star of the Sea, is not in some far distant galaxy. She is always very present and active in our voyage through life. Let that truth comfort us, no matter what is happening in our lives now. Invite Her in. She is close as Mother, Sister, Teacher and Counsellor, as Friend and Fellow Disciple of Christ. Let’s rededicate ourselves and our parish to Her today and offer Her our love and our thanks for all She does for us, sometimes without our permission!

It’s providential that we honour Her this weekend. She knows that we are about to hold over these next two Sundays two conversations in the Spirit, the name the Holy Father has given to the prayerful encounters which are central to the Church’s synodal path. She knows, too, that these conversations will be about the Sacrament of Confirmation, which is the gift of Pentecost constantly renewed across space and time for all God’s adopted children. It’s providential because in today’s Gospel, She Herself is overshadowed by the Holy Spirit so as to conceive the Son of God and to nurture and accompany His growth as man. If you think about it, the Gospel of the Annunciation is itself a conversation in the Spirit. In it, Mary shows us how it’s done. We can take a leaf out of her book as we prepare to have our parish conversations in the Spirit.

But before doing that, let me highlight that Providence has today given us another bible reading with another kind of conversation. It’s not a conversation in the Holy Spirit but in another spirit. It’s the conversation between Eve and the serpent, Lucifer himself or just the evil or rebellious inclinations around or within us. Looking at these two conversations together can show us both what not to do and what to do.

Before their conversations begin, both Eve and Mary are full of grace. They both live in deep communion with God. Both are approached by an Angel: Eve by Lucifer and Mary by Gabriel. Angel means messenger. Gabriel is the messenger of God; Lucifer is messenger of himself. Lucifer comes to provoke original sin and all its awful consequences. Gabriel comes to unfold the plan of God to save his people from their sins and the fruits of that salvation. Both Eve and Mary know the Word, the commandment, of God. Lucifer comes to incite disobedience to it; Gabriel comes to invite total surrender to it. Lucifer makes no greeting to Eve. Full of hatred and envy as he is, he can’t bring himself to call her full of grace, daughter of God or mother of the living or, even less, say the Lord is with you. Gabriel greets Mary as full of grace and in the company of the Lord.

The craftiness of Lucifer begins by trying to put doubt in Eve’s mind as to what God had actually said to her: “Did God actually say, ‘You shall not eat of any tree in the garden?’” Lucifer knows full well that God did not say that. His question is malicious and wants to insinuate how unfair God is being for, if you don’t eat from any tree, you will die of hunger. Lucifer is here obliquely accusing God of what he himself desires: the death of Eve and of humanity. Eve makes her first mistake just by answering him. Her answer does correct Lucifer in one respect but, in another, she attributes to God something which He did not say. She says that God told her and Adam not only not to eat of the tree in the centre of the garden, but also that they were not to touch it, lest they die. God never mentioned touch. So, she exaggerates God’s prohibition. She is already giving in to Lucifer’s way of distorting what God said.

Mary, for Her part, is disturbed by Gabriel’s greeting but, instead of responding, She first tries to discern, to work out, what the greeting meant. Gabriel could see She was taken aback and quickly reassures Her. As Mary then hears Gabriel speak further, Her reticence recedes. She is no longer anxious that She is being deceived by an enemy. Instead, She asks the supremely practical question: how is this to happen since I am a Virgin? Once Gabriel explains that the Holy Spirit Himself will cause Her pregnancy and describes Who the child will be, Mary consents to the Word with her “fiat”, the total surrender of Her will and Her life to the Word of God. To the Son’s pouring out of Himself, She responds in kind.

But poor Eve, having given Lucifer an inch, ends up giving him the full mile: by letting her mind and will be deceived and poisoned by his lies. Gabriel had promised Mary that her child would be the Son of God; Lucifer promises Eve that, if she disobeys God, She will herself be like God, knowing good and evil, meaning that she herself will become the source of deciding what is good and evil. In other words, she will no longer have to listen to God but only to herself. Lucifer’s seductiveness perverts Eve’s perception of things: she sees the attractiveness of what is forbidden but has somehow become blind to the mortal consequences that will follow from going for it. She gives her consent to Lucifer’s will, to self-will. Her conversation concludes in pride, disobedience, sin and death. Mary’s conversation concludes in humility, obedience, grace and life. Eve is covered with shame and hides herself. Mary is filled with joy and goes and sings Her Magnificat to Elizabeth.

Our conversations in the Spirit will be attacked by Lucifer. We must listen only to the Word of God alive in the Scriptures and in what the Church teaches us to be necessary for salvation. If Lucifer shows his ugly head, stamp on it as you would on a scorpion. The Word of God, as He did with Mary, always reassures us of the grace we have within; it can sometimes disturb us, but only to lead us forward to greater self-surrender. With others, we are there to share what the Spirit stirs up in us as a result of listening to the Word. Each one must listen with discerning mind and heart, like Mary, to what the others say. The Spirit in each of us will recognize the Spirit in the others and will also recognize if something said is not actually of the Spirit. If something is of the Spirit, it will be confirmed by others as such and especially by the Church’s teaching authority. In our personal lives, the word of evil and the Word of God both seek to engage us in conversation, either unto death or unto life. If we ask her, Mary will help us discern what is of God and what is of evil so that in the troubled seas of life Her shining star will guide us safely to harbour, into the arms of Her Son. So, guide us now, Star of the Sea, to listen and discern what the Spirit is saying to the Church today!