Whoever does the will of my heavenly Father is my brother, sister, and mother. The feast that we celebrate today comes to us from the ‘ gospel’ of James and from tradition. The feast is also connected to the dedication of the basilica of St. Mary the New in Jerusalem (21 ^st Nov 543). According to tradition, Mary was presented as a small child to the Lord in the temple by her parents. This belief arises from the fact that Mary was totally dedicated to God’s service and was obedient to God’s plans (cf. Luke 1:38). In spite of the fact that today’s feast might lack ‘historical’ backing as such, it is lent credibility by the life that the BVM led. Even as a mere teenager, Mary was able to discern the plan God had for her and endeavored to remain faithful to it for the entirety of her life. Both before and after her becoming the mother of the Savior of the world, Mary was totally dedicated to the Lord and to the Lord’s mission.
The Lord God was able to use Mary as God’s instrument because she let the Lord into her life. Mary understood what being a mound of clay in the hand of a potter meant, and she allowed the potter to mold her into whatever image the potter wanted. She gave herself entirely to the Lord, holding nothing back. And this is what we hear in the Gospel reading today. While we might be led to read today’s Gospel passage in a manner that suggests Jesus’ disrespecting her mother, nothing can be further from the truth. In his response, Jesus holds up her mother to the crowd as an example to be emulated. Mary was the epitome of doing God’s will. She held nothing back, not even her own son. She was letting ‘God’s will’ to be done in her life.