Text: John 12:1-11
Blessed are you who are here on Holy Monday
taking advantage of the opportunity Holy Week gives us each year
for engaging more closely that which is at the heart of our faith.
When we bring ourselves here to participate in these liturgies this week,
we are opening ourselves in invitation to the Holy Spirit
to enlighten our eyes, to give us deeper experiential knowledge
of just what it is that God has down for us,
for all humankind,
for all creation,
in the comprehensive action of the Cross.
Yesterday we participated in the commemoration of the events of Palm Sunday,
and then took part in the reading the whole of Matthew’s Passion,
plunging us immediately into the entire story.
Now each day of this Holy Week
we explore with more depth various segments of the story,
beginning today, Holy Monday, with the story of the anointing of Jesus
by Mary, sister of Martha and Lazarus,
the one who would sit at his feet for his teachings
rather than observing the duties of hospitality
that were her proper place and responsibility.
I have always been drawn to this story
in which a woman ministers to Jesus,
anointing him and using her hair.
There is a form of this story in each of the four gospels,
each with some significantly different details,
but the main elements are the same.
In each of the four there is objection that is made to what is happening.
Objection!
How can anyone object or begrudge a loving gift
lavishly poured out on someone so deserving of love?
And yet that is exactly what happens.
The complaint is raised, “Why this waste!”
Yes, the nard was extraordinarily expensive;
it was worth a whole year’s wage.
Recall what you put down on your income tax forms for last year’s income.
Imagine spending that entire amount on one jar of perfumed ointment.
And then you use it up, use it ALL up, in one application,
and that’s it, it is all gone.
What does this say about the Person who receives such a gift?
What does this say about the one giving such a gift
and what the giver’s attitude, thoughts and feelings are
about this Person?
Obviously this Person is worth the wasting of all that expensive nard,
the profligate spending of a whole year’s labor.
Such abundant generosity gives no thought to tomorrow.
There is only now and the Beloved present,
and this waste becomes the most appropriate and true thing to be done
right now.
If we can’t see this, then we’re no better than Judas.
We are no better than Judas,
locked in the littleness of our scarcity perspective,
so lacking in faith that our head is in tomorrow
and we totally miss the incredible power of this moment.
Those feet so lovingly anointed by Mary of Bethany,
so fragrant from the perfume,
would but a few days hence be pierced by a large spike of a nail
as his feet were hammered onto a wooden cross.
But now is the moment of devotion.
Now is the opportunity for the expression of love.
Now is the time for intimate connection.
And it is all life-giving, life-affirming, life-expanding.
It is totally salvific.
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