I carry with me a little red notebook that contains within its pages 75-and-counting stories of how two remarkable souls fell in love: notes that I take while meeting with Catholic couples preparing them for the sacrament of marriage.
One couple shared with me in extraordinary detail about how a beach engagement did not go according to plan. Another laughed as they told me how they didn’t like each other at first when they met at work – in fact, they tried avoiding each other at all costs.
And then there was Michael and Michelle – he an Ohioan; she from Delaware. When they came to me for pre-Cana preparation, they had already been together for at least ten years and shared a beautiful daughter, the spitting image of her mother who adored her daddy. The couple was clearly in love, and knew each other in a way that best friends do. So I asked them point blank: why marriage at this point? Why the Church?
Almost immediately, tears welled-up in Michelle’s eyes. Her fiancé reached for her hand to hold it as she found her words: “I’m really sick.” She put her head down for a moment and then continued: “It’s time now to put things right.”
Time to put things right: when love is authentic, that’s its purpose.
The entire story of the wedding at Cana is the story of love working to make things right, no matter the cost. A love that says: It’s time. A love that says: Trust.
One of the many things that I love about John’s Gospel story of the wedding feast at Cana is the “realness” of this moment. No fairytale here. No perfect “Brides” magazine wedding gala. Rather, it is the story of a celebration where tragedy was unfolding, most remained oblivious to it, and at just the right moment: love entered in to save the couple – and the world.
Even more incredibly, the love that entered in came from a rather unexpected place: the mother of another guest whom everyone was whispering about: a carpenter-turned-rabbi claiming to be Messiah.
Leave it to a mother to notice, right?
Mary, the mother of Jesus, noticed that the couple was running low on wine. There was no social disaster more embarrassing than having to end a celebration because there was nothing more to drink. And Mary knew this -- so she stepped in out of love for that couple: “Son,” she said. “They’ve run dry.”
Translation: they have nothing left. They need you. Help them.
Jesus’ response seems out-of-character, almost dismissive of his own mother. Why did he have to fix the problem? Why this situation? Why now?
He knew, of course. So did our Lady. By turning the water to wine at this wedding celebration of an unnamed couple in the tiny-town of Cana in Galilee, a revolution of love would publicly begin. Because of this noticeable miracle, Jesus would be writing his death-sentence. The road to Calvary started at this moment.
And Mary – his own Mother – pushed him toward it.
She could have pretended not to notice the empty jars, of course. She could have tried to protect her boy just a little longer. Who cares about the couple’s social embarrassment; she could have kept Jesus all to herself a little longer.
But that’s not what true love does. Love enters into the pain; love sacrifices for another; love trusts. Love says: “Do whatever my Son tells you.”
Our Lady’s “yes” at the Annunciation was also a “yes” that led to this Cana wedding moment: a yes that says I will lay down my own needs and desires for another. I will go to the Cross, too. I will trust completely in the will of the Father who asked me to bear His Son into the world.
Mary’s “yes” was every day, not just once. And her “yes” teaches us how to do the same thing she did – to love without counting the cost; to trust in God’s will; to not make life all about my own needs.
Never forget that Our Blessed Mother’s final recorded words in Scripture are one’s that remind us: Do whatever he tells you. And what was that? Repent. Believe. Serve the least. Forgive always. Feed. Pick up your cross and follow. That’s what we are called to do.
And Mary’s final recorded actions in the Gospels are also ones for us to emulate as well: to stand at the Cross of Christ in prayer and a willingness to suffer with; to gather with the Church as it gathers in prayer, calling upon the Spirit of God.
As Mary follows the will of God, so must we. She knew then what we now know – but which the wedding couple and guests at Cana could only dimly see: Jesus himself is the new wine. The wine that overflows the brim and spills out for all to drink: the wine of truth and mercy; the wine of sacrificial love.
It is the Wine of his Love that saves and sets free.
But in order to share in this Wine, we must drink from the Cup: the Cup of suffering; the Cup that Jesus himself drank for all time. The Cup in which he asked His Father in the Garden at Gethsemane: “Let this Cup pass, Abba, but not as I will; Your Will be done.”
Jesus always did the will of His Father. Mary did, too. They want the same for us … and will help us to live in the Father’s Divine Will if we want to give our lives to Him: in our joys and sorrows; in our suffering and triumphs; in the little daily moments that often go unnoticed to everyone but God.
At the end of the day, most moments of real love go unnoticed. Even the mighty gifts that Paul speaks of in his letter to the Corinthians (our second reading) are often those that God gives to be used humbly and quietly for the benefit of others: to help and to guide, to lead and inspire. Most moments of authentic love just seem to happen in the hidden moments of daily life: like water becoming wine. Like a Mother who notices. Like a Son rising from the dead.
As I sat with Michael and Michelle that afternoon, coming to know their story, I watched as Michael remained lovingly and quietly attentive to the woman who would become his wife: how he reached for her hand when she got emotional; how he gently supported her back as she tried to stand, knowing that the pain she was experiencing was shooting through her legs at that moment.
One year later: I watched again as the groom helped his bride off the altar step, sweeping their daughter into his arms as the three of them made their way down the aisle and into the new life of love that was now filled with grace – a grace that comes from vows exchanged before Christ and His Bride, the Church.
To most there in Church that glorious day, they saw a trio celebrating a special moment in the journey of life. That’s certainly true.
But to those with the eyes and heart to see, something greater was passing by them: love willing to do whatever Jesus, Mary’s Son, asks of them.