Patrick Comerford
The celebrations of Epiphany-tide continue today, and the week began with the Third Sunday of Epiphany (21 January 2024). Today is also the sixth day of the Week of Prayer for Christian Unity.
Christmas is a season that lasts for 40 days that continues from Christmas Day (25 December) to Candlemas or the Feast of the Presentation (2 February) The Gospel reading on Sunday (John 2: 1-11) told of the Wedding at Cana, one of the traditional Epiphany stories.
In keeping with the theme of Sunday’s Gospel reading, my reflections each morning throughout the seven days of this week include:
1, A reflection on one of seven meals Jesus has with family, friends or disciples;
2, the Gospel reading of the day;
3, a prayer from the USPG prayer diary.
3, The meal with Mary and Martha (Luke 10: 38-42):
Saint Luke’s story of the meal that Jesus has with his friends Mary and Martha is not found in the other synoptic gospels, and the only other parallel is in the Fourth Gospel, where Jesus visits Mary and Martha after the death of Lazarus.
So the meals Jesus has with Mary and Martha must be understood in the light of the Resurrection, which is prefigured by the raising of Lazarus from the dead.
For many women, and for many men too, the story of the meal with Martha and Mary raises many problems, often created by the agenda with which we now approach this story, but an agenda that may not have been possible to imagine when Saint Luke’s Gospel was written.
Our approach to understanding and explaining this meal very often depends on the way in which I understand Martha and the busy round of activities that have her distracted, and that cause her to complain to Jesus about her sister’s apparent lack of zeal and activity.
These activities in the Greek are described as Martha’s service – she is the deacon at the table: where the NRSV says ‘But Martha was distracted by her many tasks,’ the Greek says: ἡ δὲ Μάρθα περιεσπᾶτο περὶ πολλὴν διακονίαν (But Martha was being distracted by much diaconal work, service at the table).
Quite often, when this story is told, over and over, again and again, it is told as if Martha is getting stroppy about having to empty the dishwasher while Mary is lazing, sitting around, chattering with Jesus.
Does Martha see that Mary should only engage in kitchen work too?
Does she think, perhaps, that only Lazarus should be out at the front of the house, keeping Jesus engaged in lads’ batter about the latest match between Bethany United and Jerusalem City?
Is Jesus being too dismissive of Martha’s complaints?
Or is he defending Mary’s right to engage in a full discussion of the Word, to engage in an alive ministry of the Word?
Martha is presented in this story as the dominant, leading figure. It is she who takes the initiative and who welcomes Jesus into her home (verse 38). It is she who offers the hospitality, who is the host at the meal, who is the head of the household – in fact, Lazarus isn’t even on the stage for this scene, and Mary is merely ‘her sister’ – very much the junior partner in the household.
Yet it is Mary, the figure on the margins, who offers the sort of hospitality that Jesus commends and praises.
Mary simply listens to Jesus, sitting at his feet, like a student would sit at the feet of a great rabbi or teacher, waiting and willing to learn what is being taught.
Martha is upset about this, and comes out from the back and asks Jesus to pack off Mary to the kitchen where she can help Martha.
But perhaps Martha was being too busy with her household tasks.
I was once invited to dinner by people I knew as good friends. And for a long time I was left on my own with the other guest as the couple busied themselves with things in the kitchen – they had decided to do the washing up before bringing out the coffee … the wife knew that if she left the washing up until later, the husband would shirk his share of the task.
But being left on our own was a little embarrassing. Part of the joy of being invited to someone’s home for dinner is the conversation around the table.
When I have been on retreats, at times, in Greek Orthodox monasteries, conversation at the table has been discouraged by a monk reading, usually from the writings of the Early Fathers, from the Patristic writings.
But a good meal, good table fellowship, good hospitality is not just about the food that is served, but about the conversation around the table too.
One commentator suggests that Martha has gone overboard in her duties of hospitality. She has spent too much time preparing the food, and has failed to pay real attention to her guest.
On the other hand, Mary has chosen her activity (verse 42). It does not just happen by accident. Mary has chosen to offer Jesus the real hospitality that a guest should be offered. She talks to Jesus, and real conversation is about both talking and listening.
If she is sent back into the kitchen, then – in the absence of Lazarus, indeed, in the notable absence of the disciples – Jesus would be left without hospitality, without words of welcome, without conversation.
Perhaps Martha might have been better off she had a more simple lifestyle, if she had prepared just one dish for her guest and for her family – might I be bold enough to suggest, if she had been content for them to sup on bread and wine alone.
She could have joined Mary in her hospitality, in welcoming Jesus to their home and to their table; they could have been in full communion with one another.
In this way, Martha will experience what her sister is experiencing, but which she is too busy to notice – their visitor’s invitation into the hospitality of God.
One commentator, Brendan Byrne, points out the subtle point being made in this story:
‘Frenetic service, even service of the Lord, can be a deceptive distraction from what the Lord really wants. Luke has already warned that the grasp of the word can be choked by the cares and worries of life … Here the cares and worries seem well justified – are they not in the service of the Lord? But precisely therein lies the power of the temptation, the great deceit. True hospitality – even that given directly to the Lord – attends to what the guest really wants.’
Christ in the House of Martha and Mary by Diego Velázquez (1630)Mark 3: 31-35 (NRSVA):
31 Then his mother and his brothers came; and standing outside, they sent to him and called him. 32 A crowd was sitting around him; and they said to him, ‘Your mother and your brothers and sisters are outside, asking for you.’ 33 And he replied, ‘Who are my mother and my brothers?’ 34 And looking at those who sat around him, he said, ‘Here are my mother and my brothers! 35 Whoever does the will of God is my brother and sister and mother.’
Today’s Prayers (Tuesday 23 January 2024):
The theme this week in ‘Pray With the World Church,’ the Prayer Diary of the Anglican mission agency USPG (United Society Partners in the Gospel), is: ‘Provincial Programme on Capacity Building in Paraná.’ This theme was introduced on Sunday by Christina Takatsu Winnischofer, Igreja Episcopal Anglicana do Brasil.
The USPG Prayer Diary today (23 January 2024) invites us to pray in these words:
Heavenly Father, we pray for all the clergy and laity in the Province of Brazil. May You strengthen them in will, knowledge and health so that they can reach out to their communities.
The Collect:
Almighty God,
whose Son revealed in signs and miracles
the wonder of your saving presence:
renew your people with your heavenly grace,
and in all our weakness
sustain us by your mighty power;
through Jesus Christ your Son our Lord,
who is alive and reigns with you,
in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
one God, now and for ever.
The Post-Communion Prayer:
Almighty Father,
whose Son our Saviour Jesus Christ is the light of the world:
may your people,
illumined by your word and sacraments,
shine with the radiance of his glory,
that he may be known, worshipped, and obeyed
to the ends of the earth;
for he is alive and reigns, now and for ever.
Additional Collect:
God of all mercy,
your Son proclaimed good news to the poor,
release to the captives,
and freedom to the oppressed:
anoint us with your Holy Spirit
and set all your people free
to praise you in Christ our Lord.
Yesterday’s reflection (The Feeding of the Multitude)
Continued tomorrow (The meal with Zacchaeus)
Scripture quotations are from the New Revised Standard Version Bible: Anglicised Edition copyright © 1989, 1995, National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide. http://nrsvbibles.org
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