JESUS SAID TO HER : «WOMAN …»
Invitation of the General Chapter of 2002
The contemplation of the Incarnation of the Word leads us to follow Him as Mary did:
«Mary, the first disciple of Jesus, leads us:
to say our ‘Yes’ anew each day,
to unite our offering with that of Christ.»1
And we are invited to find our inspiration in the Word of God, but in reading it with a
feminine look.
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Mary of the Passion may help us in this, by presenting Mary to us as
«The Woman of true power».
a) In what way is Mary «the woman of true power» for Mary of the Passion?
- The first time we find this expression in her writings is at the Poor Clares in Nantes, when she
received what she would later call her «name from heaven»; her personal call or charism:
«Mary Victim of Jesus, and of Jesus Crucified, the woman of true power».
It is therefore an expression which, for her, indicates a vocation: that which consists, as she
said elsewhere, in «continuing the mission of Mary», in making her whole life an offering
in communion with that of Jesus even to the sacrifice of the Cross, for the Church and for
the world. Doing this, she became «the little woman of true power».
- During her whole life she would seek to deepen the meaning of this name given to
Mary, from which she received inspiration: How and why is Mary «the woman of true
power»? What is this «true power»? How could she acquire it for herself and transmit it to
her daughters?…
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Through her Spiritual Notes we can pick out some principal emphases: the first to be
redeemed by Christ, Mary is all powerful, because she gave Jesus to the world and with
Him the Gospel, path of Truth and Charity, of poverty / detachment from riches,
simplicity…
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She can do this because, «all pure», she is the temple of the Holy Spirit to whom belongs
and who communicates «true power». Co-operating entirely in his action which «renews
the face of the earth» enabling her to be «reborn from above», she is «the New Eve»,
mother of the New Adam and of all humanity.
Chapter Document p. 3, nº 4
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At the end of her life, Mary of the Passion saw with more clarity and intensity this «true
power» of Mary through her basic accord with the Spirit as is seen in her last retreat.2
b) When Jesus calls his mother: «WOMAN» …
- John speaks of Mary in two passages of his Gospel: at the marriage feast at Cana (Jn 2:
1-12), and at foot of the cross (Jn 19: 25-34). These are two key texts: one at the beginning
of Jesus’ public ministry and the other at the end. Apart from that, she does not appear
since in John there is no mention of the birth or infancy of Jesus, nor of the meetings or
interventions of Mary during his ministry.
It is only indicated that after the miracle of the change of water into wine, the Lord «went
down to Capernaum with his mother, his brothers and his disciples» (2: 12). This lets us
suppose that discreetly she always remained a loving and maternal presence for him.
Although there are only two short passages, these passages are very deep and rich in
meaning at various levels, as in all John’s writings. In meditating on them here, we will
limit ourselves to the theme which interests us.
- The first remarkable thing is the name Jesus uses to address his mother:
He calls her «WOMAN»! For a long time this term seemed insulting to Mary and led to
much justification and sometimes embarrassed commentaries … yet it is perhaps her most
beautiful title and the richest in meaning. The texts situate «the mother of Jesus» in an
essential role at the heart of the Covenant, they make her an emblematic figure of «the
woman», icon on earth of the «maternal face» of God, when she acts according to her deep
being and says YES to the mission which is proper to her. In welcoming the Spirit, all her
feminine values are then placed at the service of God’s plan, and become spiritual
maternity for the world.
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The two passages are found, at the beginning and at the end of the mission of Jesus who
will bring the First Covenant to its accomplishment by sealing the New. They frame the
time of his public ministry, situating this time of gestation of the Church, dawn of the
messianic era, in close cooperation with Mary and the Holy Spirit.
- At Cana , Mary is «already there» when Jesus arrives with his new disciples.
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When the wine ran short, as a practical woman attentive to others, she noticed it and
felt straightaway the embarrassment of their hosts. Confidently she spoke about it to her
son … who had not noticed anything: «They have no wine!»
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Although it is not possible to stop at the account of a banal event like a village
wedding, we must not dismiss it and pass on straightaway to a more symbolic level.
A life which is simply human is the place of incarnation and of communication of the
Word and of grace.
 Here, the man Jesus who is beginning his messianic ministry among the people,
learns from the intuition and empathy of his mother, to open his eyes to people’s
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Cf. «Where are you leading me?», retreat 1903
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needs, to be sensitive to their aspirations. From his infancy, Mary, like all good
mothers, played the role of awakening his regard and his heart which is so
important, especially for a son.
 Thus, according to Luke3, after searching with Joseph for three days, when she
found the adolescent in the Temple, causing the doctors and all the assistants to
wonder at his intelligence of the Scriptures, she had brought Him back to
reality, while appealing to his heart: «Son, why have you done this to us? Your
father and I have sought you sorrowing.»
Responding with the brusqueness of adolescence, He had then made her
enter on the path of progressive detachment that every mother must accomplish
towards her growing son: «Why did you seek me? Did you not know that I must
be in my Father’s house?»
But suddenly He Himself awoke to another dimension of Scripture: if we
must understand it, it is in order to live it. Now, is not one of the first
commandments: «Honour your father and your mother»? … «He went down
with them to Nazareth and was subject to them.»
 By the time of Cana, her role as educator had finished a long time ago, and her
son has started recruiting his disciples as all the «rabbi» did. However, she
remained the discreet presence, foreseeing, effective, which He would need until
the Cross: the first «woman disciple», with a faithful heart, on whom He could
count in spite of everything.
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But for the moment, Jesus’ reply to her request marks his lack of understanding:
«Woman, what has it to do with me or with you? ...» After all, this lack of foresight
on the part of their hosts was not their affair!
 But «she who believed» from the beginning, knew her son! Her heart went
beyond the apparent refusal: she is sure of Him, and something – or Someone –
urged her on interiorly. She said calmly to the servants: «Do whatever He tells
you.»
 In the synoptics, it is the Spirit who, after Jesus’ sojourn in the desert, engages
Him to undertake his mission as Messiah. Here, somewhat like at the Visitation,
the voice of the Spirit passes through Mary’s compassionate step: suddenly He
understands that «the hour is now» to perform a sign of power which will accredit
Him as the Messiah. (John’s Gospel is known as the Book of Signs.)
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What follows after the account, enables us to penetrate the symbolic dimension of this
scene. We cannot enter into all the very rich details of the sign which is given; and who
will ever penetrate them completely?
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Notice especially the role played by «water», symbol of the feminine and of the
Spirit.
To understand its role here, we must place this role in the general perspective of
the Gospel of John, and in the immediate context of the account of Cana, as
inserted in the texts on the sign of «water».
 Preceding the text of the marriage feast, we have in Jn 1: 31, 33:
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Cf. Lk 2: 41-52
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And John bore witness, saying «I saw the Spirit descend as a dove from
heaven, and it remained on him. I myself did not know him; but he who sent me
to baptise with water said to me, ‘He on whom you see the Spirit descend and
remain, this is he who baptises with the Holy Spirit.’»
 At the end of the text of the marriage feast, there is in Jn 3: 5:
Jesus answered him [Nicodemus]: «Truly, truly, I say to you unless one is born
of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter the Kingdom of God.»
 And in the following chapter (the Samaritan woman): Jn 4: 10-14:
Jesus answered her, «If you knew the gift of God and who it is that is saying to
you, ‘give me a drink’, you would have asked him and he would have given you
living water…Everyone who drinks this water will thirst again, but whoever
drinks of the water that I shall give him will never thirst; the water that I shall
give him will become in him a spring of water welling up to eternal life.»
 Finally, the key text is Jn 7: 37-39. It is the last day of the feast of Tents, the day
people go to draw water from Siloe, which prefigures the messianic and
eschatological «Day» at the end of time. Jesus invites those who are thirsty to
come and draw from Him Living Water in abundance:
«Now this he said about the Spirit which those who believed in him were to
receive.»
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Here the passing from the First Covenant to the New Covenant is clear. In the first,
the rites of water, which become outdated, were purifiers (cf. the empty jugs of the
«6 days» of creation); they prepared the New Covenant, that of the «baptism in the
Spirit», the Living Water brought by Christ which enables us to be born to eternal
Life. It is the beginning of the messianic era which will end with the messianic
marriage feast where water will become the wine of gladness, anticipated in the
Eucharist.
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And «Mary is there», working with the Spirit at the passing between the First
Covenant and its accomplishment in the New, «giving Jesus to the world», on the
threshold of his ministry.
- On Calvary, Mary «is there» still, and right to the end:
«Near the cross of Jesus were his mother, and his mother’s sister, Mary the
wife of Cleophas, and Mary Magdalene. When Jesus saw his mother, and the
disciple whom he loved standing near, he said to his mother, ‘WOMAN,
behold your son!’ Then he said to the disciple, ‘Behold your mother!’ And
from that hour the disciple took her to his own home. 4
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Mary standing near the cross with some women.
We will not dwell on this scene which speaks for itself.
Jn 19: 25-27. - Notice that John uses the word: “his / your mother” 5 times when he speaks of her, while Jesus
gives her the title of: « Woman » when he calls her to her new vocation of spiritual motherhood.
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The fidelity of the maternal and feminine presence has never been denied; she is
more than ever a sign of the compassion of the Father at a time when, according to
the Law, the crucified person seems to be definitively rejected by Him.5
That compassionate presence is necessary for Jesus, in order for Him to accomplish
his offering in which she communes, as she always did, in faith, and in spite of her
sorrow.
More than ever also, in her is transparent the face of the Consoler (Paraclete, Spirit)
whose presence strengthened both of them within, and whom Jesus promised his
disciples that He would send as a gift when He would be with the Father.
«Woman, behold your son.»
Here, she is the universal mother; mother in the broadest and deepest sense; the most
spiritual.
 The people of the New Covenant is prefigured there at the foot of the Cross. The
disciples, men and women, who would soon be reunited in the «upper room» to
receive the effusion of the Spirit of Holiness will learn from Mary how to welcome
his action so that «the living and acting Word» may be incarnate not only in one
culture but in all those of the world; and so that all faces may be fashioned, little by
little, in the resemblance of the Risen Son, present in the invisible.
 Until the return of Christ on the last day, the disciples, men and women, will learn
from Mary how to live their Covenant in the image of that of the Word and of the
Spirit, as children of the Father.
Women in the Church will learn from her and from the Spirit their maternal role, and
men after the example of the «disciple whom Jesus loved» will learn from her true
power which is service.
 Then at the end of time, the Church will really have become «the woman crowned
with twelve stars», the spouse who, her ministry completed, ascends with the Spirit to
the meeting with the Bridegroom, all her children already gathered in the Kingdom of
the Father for the marriage feast.6
Conclusion: «THE WOMAN OF TRUE POWER»
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The long road of the Covenant between God and humanity, stretches between Gen 1 and
Rev 22: 21. It is also the history of the slow, tormented and progressive ascent of this
humanity towards true Life in God. From one end to the other, women are called on to
play an essential role: from Eve to the Spouse in the Apocalypse.
Eve, the primitive woman, made a mistake about «power». We can’t hold it against her:
«mother of life», her «antennas» were more in harmony than those of Adam, «the earthy
one», with the mystery whose power was beyond man; she sought it in her environment:
the «spirits» of nature, idols.
All the more so since dialogue between him and her, and with God, was not yet
established: it was necessary first to learn the word which is proper to man; then to
discover interpersonal relationship. For the moment, it is the strongest who dominates
and takes all in his power.
The woman is not perceived as a person until the time of Abraham; this is confirmed by
Abraham going so as to acquire a cave in which to bury Sarah. But the woman is still only
Cf. Dt 21: 22-23
Cf. Rev 21-22
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a person of inferior rank. In a world where physical force, and as a consequence violence,
reigns, she has no recognised power.
Later, when the Covenant will have progressed further, she will take an active part in it,
like Miriam, sister of Moses and Aaron.
But we must wait for Mary of Nazareth to see womanhood fully attain personhood, with
whom God engages directly in dialogue in view of the Covenant. It is then that God as a
Trinity of Persons is also revealed: when the Spirit brings about the Incarnation, with the
consent and co-operation of Mary who has become «the new Eve and mother of the New
Adam», «the woman of true power» according to God’s plan, «the woman par
excellence».
For the Church, until the Parousia, she remains «the mother» given by God with the
Spirit, to bring the birthing of the new humanity in the image of Christ to its
accomplishment.
For every woman, her sister (if she does not mistake the «spirit»), she is joy, pride, and
an inexhaustible source of inspiration.
For every man, she is an invitation to become the brother of Christ – Servant, and with
him "beloved son".
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