well that first reading from Ezekiel is
one of those rare moments when the
scriptures and experience come together
so perfectly that no word of
interpretation is required but let me
glance at at the feasts for today the
queenship of Mary I fully realized that
at first glance it seems rather twee and
sentimental may be pious grandmothers
with a taste and saccharine spirituality
would be into the queenship of Mary
right nothing could be less biblical
than that
seeing through biblical eyes this feast
days of extraordinary importance and is
anything but twee and sentimental so of
course the the clearest reference to the
queenship of Mary is the great scene
from the 12th chapter of Revelation the
woman clothed the Sun with the coronet
of 12 stars in her head so there she is
the queen of Israel the 12 tribes but we
soon discover she's a queen mother she's
about to give birth to the one who will
rule the nations with the rod of iron
so she's the Queen Mother of Israel now
a lot of recent scholarship has been
telling us about the importance of that
image it wasn't so much the wife of the
king but the mother of the king who
mattered in ancient Israel and both the
king and the Queen Mother were warrior
figures there's not one king of Israel
who's not a warrior and the Queen Mother
is associated tightly with the king of
Israel and indeed in Revelation that's
just what we see right as the one was
about to give birth there's the dragon
about to devour the child the child and
mother are swept away and then we hear a
great war breaks out between Michael and
and his angels and the and the enemy now
look right before chapter 12 chapter 11
and mind you those chapters didn't exist
when revelation was written so that's
just an artificial division right before
the mention of the woman clothed in the
Sun the seer looks into the heavenly
temple
and was he see but the Ark of the
Covenant the Ark of the Covenant that
carried the Ten Commandments that was a
sign of Yahweh's presence among his
people the Ark of the Covenant that was
carried often into battle with Israel
now who's the real Ark of the Covenant
and the church fathers all saw this but
Mary who bore within herself the Word
made flesh
so she's the true Ark of the Covenant
this warrior queen who liked the ark is
carried into battle here's a very
interesting link of course it's David
who finds the Ark mind you in the hill
country of Judah all the overtones with
a visitation scene there's all kinds of
overtones from 2 Samuel the ark is found
in the hill country of Judah and then
David brings it in to his holy City
dancing with abandon right before the
Lord what do we hear now in the Gospel
of Luke is that Mary goes into the hill
country of Judah to visit her cousin and
then when John the Baptist infant unborn
John the Baptist hears the voice of Mary
he does his own version of David's great
ecstatic dance he leaps in his mother's
womb in the presence of the true Ark of
the Covenant okay that's what the Bible
I think wants us to know about the
queenship of Mary she's all about the
spiritual struggle the spiritual warfare
Paul said we battle not against flesh
and blood but against powers and
principalities listen brothers does
anybody doubt it in the wake of the last
25 years I wrote a little piece of a few
days ago about the mckarrick thing and I
mentioned how when I was going through
school we tended to read the devil as a
literary device or a symbol right for me
the last 25 years have completely
reconfirmed my stunts of the devil is a
real spiritual power because the scandal
we've been living through is a
diabolical masterpiece I mean can you
imagine any better way to undermine the
work of the church than what we've been
going through the last 25 years we don't
battle
flesh and blood I mean we do but the
ultimate struggle is a spiritual one
this feast day is not twe and
sentimental
it's about getting under the command of
the Queen Mother and of the king in the
spiritual struggle I mean it's not the
least bit sentimental but in statues of
the Blessed Mother she's crushing the
head of the serpent she's not messing
around and this is a serious struggle
and she wants us in the battle with her
you know now with that in mind a quick
look at the gospel that wonderful story
that confounds people up and down in the
centuries good good it's meant to let me
just shift the metaphor a little bit
let's say you're in World War two and
you're fighting in this desperate battle
the enemy is coming at you and it goes
on all night long you've been fighting
for hours even hand-to-hand combat it's
a matter of life and death and you think
at any moment you're gonna be
overwhelmed but you hear a rumour that
there is help coming reinforcements are
coming and by god they come it at dawn
and they join in the battle and then
you're able finally to win the great
struggle and there you all sit now
exhausted on the ground what's the last
thing on your mind you know I fought for
10 hours these bozos fought for 20
minutes and we're all gonna get a Purple
Heart
I mean would anybody think that at that
point would anyone be worried about
who's getting how much Honor
no thank God you came
thank God you joined the struggle and we
won together we won we who fought for 10
hours you who fought for 20 minutes but
but by God together we won see when our
minds are fixed on the struggle they're
fixed on what matters
we don't worry about wealth pleasure
power and honor I mentioned David the
great warrior right David David who was
always ready to enter into the struggle
but remember the decisive chapter in 2
Samuel that commences this way
that time of year when Kings go on
campaign oh yeah I know that time of
year in the springtime when David was
always ready to go on campaign David was
always at the front of the of the army
you know that time of year David was at
home on the roof of his palace having
just woken up from a long nap it's
typical of biblical they connaissez him
there
you know it's you know you don't get
Henry James with the Bible you get these
very rapidly drawing portraits what are
we meant to see the old fighter wasn't
in the game he wasn't in the game and he
was napping he was napping while the
Army's out fighting he's home napping
and what happens see when that when that
is going on now he looks around the roof
isn't she something look at her hey and
I'm the king it's good to be king I'm
gonna use all my power I'm gonna
manipulate things I'm gonna arrange for
Bathsheba to come to my bed even though
she's married to my heroic captain Uriah
I'm gonna mess with him I'm gonna mess
with his marriage I'm gonna kill him so
I can get Bathsheba look what happened
the minute his mind was off the fight
pleasure power take over that's what I
want all the pleasure and power I can
get see brothers that's what happens
when we stop fighting the spiritual war
when we keep our eyes off the struggle
that's when we get in trouble
I mean I'll read the last 25 years the
last 50 or 70 years if you wanted to
Pennsylvania report read those last
year's what's happened an awful lot of
David's who should have been out
fighting were on the roof napping and
we're looking around at what they could
get right back to Ezekiel not caring for
the Sheep but abusing the Sheep and
using the Sheep for their own ends
I mean my point this is the oldest story
in the world in some way it's when we
get our eyes off the spiritual struggle
that we fall back into these sinful
patterns so I'm this great feast day the
Queen ship of Mary Queen Mother the
warrior queen and she's not fighting
with the weapons of the world I mean
they don't do any good by the way
against powers and principalities so
we're not talking about you know going
on Crusades and all that but onward you
know Christian soldiers marching as off
to war a spiritual war
it's napping on the roof it got a lot of
us in trouble
it's napping on the roof that time of
year when Kings go on campaign you know
what time of year that is that's every
moment of the year that's every moment
of the year when we should be going on
campaign under the queenship of Mary
under the kingship of Christ entering
into the spiritual struggle when we
forget that that's when we get in
trouble and we fall back into wealth
pleasure power honor so let's ask
ourselves that searching question we
spending too much time napping up on the
roof or are we in the game