“This is where my throne shall be, this is where I will set the soles of my feet.”
“The glory of the Lord will dwell in our land.”
“The greatest among you must be your servant. … Whoever humbles himself will be exalted.”
Today’s readings set humility and glory alongside each other. While they are on such different ends of a spectrum for us, it seems they are very close to each other for God. Why might that be? I think one of the Ignatian catchphrases, “finding God in all things,” gets at this. Where only two or three are gathered, God is there. What brings people close to God is glorified. God is not so limited as to be absent from the small and ordinary.
Friends in ministry have referred to themselves along the way as “glorified event planners” or “Jesus’ party planners.” How might glory shine through the mundane tasks of grocery shopping for a retreat, tracking attendance and registrations in spreadsheets, sending emails, printing resources, etc.? How might glory shine through the mundane tasks in your daily life? What will all those boring details look like, glorified, in light of how they allowed people to encounter Christ?
Today is also the Memorial of the Queenship of Mary. Her humility was in tune with God’s humility. Mary’s freely given “yes” made a way for God to “set the soles of [his] feet” “in our land,” literally humble, on the ground and of the earth. God wanted to get his feet dirty walking with us, dwelling with us, and to show us how humility, grounded-ness, is the only path to true glory. Mary walked that path with Jesus perhaps more closely than any other human, in all the ordinary and extraordinary moments of his life. She who humbled herself is exalted with her Son, on earth and on high. Alleluia!
“Mary, first among the blessed, robed in heaven’s beauty bright,
you rejoice with saints and angels in your Son’s resplendent light.
Mother now of all the blessed, make your pilgrim people strong;
keep us faithful till we join you, praising God in endless song.”
-Last stanza of “Mary, First Among Disciples.” Text: Delores Dufner, OSB © 2007
Listen to the rest of “Mary, First Among Believers.”
Molly Mattingly
I grew up in north of Chicago with my parents, brother, and sister. My parents led the 5:00pm Mass music ensemble at my home parish while I was growing up, so you could also say I grew up in a church choir! Music has always been a part of my life, through school choirs, piano lessons, and music ministry. I accompanied and sang in choirs in grade school and at Carmel Catholic High School. During that time, I also swam on my YMCA swim team and worked as a lifeguard and swim instructor at a local park district.
After high school, I studied Music Education and Music Theory at Ithaca College, with an emphasis in piano and choral direction. There I was also co-director of our Catholic Community’s music ministry. I graduated from Ithaca in ’09, and like many of my classmates who graduated the year the recession peaked, was lucky enough to find a place in grad school. I got my Masters in Sacred Music from the University of Notre Dame (go Irish!), where I was involved with the Folk Choir and Notre Dame Vision retreat program. Most recently, I spent two years in Wexford, Ireland as a member and House Director of the House of Brigid, a lay community of young adults dedicated to the renewal of the Church in Ireland through catechesis and music. (Check out their website if you want to see other blog posts I’ve written and see beautiful pictures of Ireland.) And now, my music ministry vocation brought me to Creighton University and St. John’s, where I am the music director at the parish and Campus Ministry!
