
On this Second day of February, the Holy Mother Church celebrates the feast of the presentation of Our Lord Jesus in the temple, the fourth Joyful mystery. Today, we also celebrate those men and women who in a special way have consecrated themselves to the service of Lord through the profession of the evangelical counsels. The evangelical counsels of poverty, chastity and obedience. These men and women through these counsels present themselves as a living sacrifice to God just like Christ was presented in the temple.
In our first reading from the book of Malachi 3:1-4, the prophet Malachi prophesies about Our Lord’s sudden appearance in his temple. In other words, the Lord of the temple entered into his own temple. The first temple Our Lord entered was the womb of the blessed virgin Mary, in taking possession of that temple, he purifies Our Blessed Mother from every ritual impurities that was associated with child birth according to the Jewish custom. Now, Our Lord enters his own temple, not as a judge but as a refiner and purifier of our souls. The prophet Malachi describes Our Lord as a refiner’s fire and a fuller’s soap. He will sit and purify the sons of Levi and refine them like gold and silver until they present right offerings to the Lord. Ideally, when gold is melted with fire there is a process of purification that happens, the dross which happens to float on the melted gold is scooped off.
In like manner, a fuller’s soap is a very strong cleansing agent that can remove the toughest stains. The imagery of these two cleansing agents therefore depicted how Our Lord will purify the sons of Levi who offered polluted sacrifices in the temple, and by extension all of us so that we may offer ourselves as a living sacrifice to God just like he offered himself. The psalmist in our responsorial psalm recalls how the people of Israel welcomed the ark of God with great rejoicing saying: “O gates lift high your heads, grow higher ancient doors, let him enter the king of glory.” The entrance of the ark of God meant the presence of God amongst them. In the same fashion, Christ filled his temple with his presence at his presentation, and Simeon and Anna exclaimed with great rejoicing.
Beloved, when God is present in our lives, we cannot but have reasons to rejoice. One of the ways of having God present in our lives is by emptying ourselves that he may fill us. In self-emptying, we present ourselves as living sacrifices pleasing to God our Father. In our second reading, from Heb. 2:14-18, the author of this letter presents Christ as one who emptied himself of his glory and majesty and assumed our human nature so save us from the power of death. Christ took our nature that he may become for us a merciful and faithful high priest, just like the prophet Malachi prophesied about him in our first reading.
In our gospel reading from the gospel of Lk.2:22-40, the evangelist Luke singlehandedly presents the account of the presentation of Our Lord. In his account of the Presentation of our Lord, Luke wishes to project Joseph and Mary as faithful and devout Jews who obeyed the Jewish customs, and taught their Son to do same. According to the Jewish custom, every first born male that opens the womb must be presented to the Lord forty days after his birth. (Ex.13:2, 12).
The child to be presented could either be redeemed with a lamb one-yearold, a young pigeon or turtledoves. (Lev.12:6,8) However, the parents of Jesus were poor that they could not afford the lamb or young pigeon, so they opted for a pair of turtle doves. We can learn from Joseph and Mary in this instance how to be content with little, especially in a world where many persons want to compete in order to impress. Again, another significant event that happened in today’s gospel was the purification of Mary. Luke puts it this way; “when the time came for their purification according to the law of Moses, the parents of Jesus brought him up to the temple to present him to the Lord.”
The rite of the purification was one of the ritual cleansing rites a woman must undergo after child birth. This is so because a woman who bore a child was regarded as unclean. Now, for a woman who had a male child, the period of her legal impurity lasted for forty days, with a rite of purification to end it. (Lev. 12:3-4). However, Mary was not obligated to keep this law since she was most pure having conceived the Son of God in a miraculous manner. Yet she never opted out of social obligations. Nevertheless, as in so many other instances, Mary chose to act like any other Jewish woman of her time. She wanted to be an example of obedience and humility. Mary by this gesture, teaches us how to pass unnoticed among our contemporaries with our hearts on fire with the love of God.
Beloved in Christ, the feast of the presentation of the Lord was once referred to as the Candlemas around the 8th century. This was so because Pope Sergius introduced the solemn procession of the clergy and laity carrying blessed candle into the Church, a tacit reminder that Jesus is the light to the gentiles as well as his entry into the temple. This procession also symbolizes how our lives as Christians should give light to others since we have become partakers of the light of Christ through our baptism. Dearly beloved in Christ, we have to learn how to give ourselves, to burn before God like the light placed on the lampstand to give light to those who walk in darkness; like the sanctuary lamps that burn by the altar, giving off light till their last drop is consumed. Like Joseph, Simeon and Anna who offered up themselves whole and entire as living sacrifices before God, serving God day and night.
Although the ritual of purification has no place in Christian faith today, since a woman cannot incur any stain whatsoever because of childbirth that would require purification. However, the purification that we all need is that of our hearts, which would render us as fitting and living sacrifices presented before our God. Let us strive to attain this purification.
• Rev. Fr. Paul Mbah is Associate Priest, Our Lady Star of the Sea Catholic Church, Chevron, Lekki, Lagos.