SECOND SUNDAY AFTER THE EPIPHANY

January 16, 2022

St. Uriel’s, Sea Girt, N.J.

John 2:1-11

Today’s Gospel reading identifies Jesus’ changing the water into wine as “the first of his signs.” The Evangelist John uses the term “sign” to describe Our Lord’s miracles. The opening address in The Book of Common Prayer’s wedding service remarks that “Our Lord Jesus Christ adorned [married] life by his presence and first miracle at a wedding in Cana of Galilee.” So, changing the water into wine has the distinction of being Our Lord’s first miracle: perhaps not only in the sense of being the first in sequence but also in the sense of being the model and pattern for his subsequent miracles and mighty works.

With that in mind, I want to focus on the Blessed Virgin Mary’s role in this story. She doesn’t figure into any of the other Gospel miracles in quite the way she figures into this one. So, it’s especially interesting and informative to observe how Mary and Jesus interact with each other when the wine gives out at the wedding in Cana.

John’s account begins: “[There] was a marriage at Cana in Galilee, and the mother of Jesus was there. Jesus was also invited to the marriage with his disciples.” Notice how from the beginning Mary is the pre-eminent figure in the scene: John tells us first that the mother of Jesus was at the marriage and only then mentions that Jesus was also invited with his disciples. By thus calling attention to Mary at the outset, John prepares us for her central role in the miracle that follows.

When Mary points out to Jesus that the wine has given out, he responds with one of his more problematic and difficult sayings: “O woman, what have you to do with me?” He seems to be brushing her off – even to the point of being rude and disrespectful.

What are we to make of these words? Well, first of all, the idiom “what have you to do with me” is notoriously difficult to translate. In the original Greek, it literally reads, “What to me and to you?” Some translators render it, “What concern is this of ours?” Others: “Why are you involving me in this?” And others: “How is this concern of yours my concern?” However we translate it, the import is clear: Jesus is holding the problem at arm’s length. Such immediate practical needs, pressing as they may be, fall short of the ultimate purpose for which he’s come into the world. So, he adds: “My hour is not yet come—the hour, that is, when he will fulfill his real mission to redeem and save a fallen creation.

Furthermore, his remark that his hour is not yet come implies that whatever sign he knows he's going to perform now must inevitably fall short of the greatest sign of all: namely, his death, resurrection, ascension, and coming again. Wonderful as it may be in itself, the present marriage celebration in Cana is only an anticipation and foretaste of that cosmic wedding feast when Christ and his Church, indeed heaven and earth, are joined as bridegroom and bride in the Kingdom of heaven.

And then there’s the form of address: “O woman.” In English, addressing a woman in this way will almost always come across as discourteous and disrespectful, but not so in the Hebrew or Aramaic that Jesus spoke, nor in the Greek of John’s Gospel. There, it might better be translated, “Madam,” “Ma’am,” or even “My Lady.” Nonetheless in New Testament times it was an unusually formal way for a son to address his mother: the more common biblical idiom would be “My mother,” or “O my mother.”

Here, it’s critical to recall that in John’s Gospel, Jesus again addresses Mary as “Woman”—from the cross when he entrusts her to the safekeeping of the Beloved Disciple: “Woman, behold, your son!” And to the disciple: “Behold, your mother!” 

Both these instances of Jesus addressing Mary as “Woman” hark back to a passage in the third chapter of Genesis, where God says to the serpent who’s tempted Adam and Eve to sin: “I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your seed and her seed; he shall bruise your head, and you shall bruise his heel.” So, the suggestion is that both at Cana and from the cross Jesus is identifying Mary as the new Eve, the new mother of all living, just as he himself is the new Adam. (In Hebrew, incidentally, the name “Adam” simply means “man.”) Together, Mary and Jesus are the prototypes of a new humanity in which the effects of our first parents’ disobedience are canceled and reversed. Mary is the new Woman, and Jesus is the new Man, in whom the whole human race receives a fresh start and a new beginning. 

 “When the wine gave out, the mother of Jesus said to him, ‘They have no wine.’” Here Mary takes on the role of intercessor. She perceives a problem or need. Then she takes that need to her Son. Notice, however, that she doesn’t tell him what to do. She just makes the need known. Some Christian spiritual writers commend that technique when we bring our needs to God in prayer. God does want us to share our concerns with him. But he doesn’t necessarily need us to tell him what to do if we trust that in his infinite wisdom he knows what’s best for us and will take care of us no matter what.

Having brought the problem to Jesus, Mary simply leaves it with him, and instructs the servants, “Do whatever he tells you.” At this point, Jesus takes over, telling the servants to fill with water the six stone jars standing there, thus setting the scene for the miraculous transformation to follow.

Mary’s intercession with her Son in this dialogue offers us a model and pattern for our own prayers of intercession. We notice a need in the world around us, perhaps among our families, friends, or neighbors. We bring that need to Jesus in prayer, but preferably without telling him what to do. Then, we leave that need with Jesus—and we stand ready to do whatever he tells us.

In our prayers, moreover, we can always ask Mary to bring our needs to her Son on our behalf. Just as we pray for one another here on earth, so she and all the Saints pray for us in heaven. So, it’s entirely legitimate to ask her for her prayers. Mary always points us to Jesus. Contrary to Protestant objections that devotion to the Blessed Mother detracts and distracts from the worship of her Son, Mary always brings us closer to Jesus. When we bring our needs to her, she brings those same needs to Jesus, and then she lovingly exhorts us: “Do whatever he tells you.”