7/26/2014 – Joachim & Anne –

      I am not celebrating a daily mass today since it is Saturday and I have the Vigil mass in the evening, but I wanted to reflect briefly upon the lives of the saints we celebrate today - St Joachim and St Anne, the parents of the Blessed Virgin Mary. 

       They are not mentioned by name in the Bible, but they have been honored since the days of the early Church.   The Tradition that has been passed down from our early Church fathers and mothers tells us that Joachim and Anne were an older couple without children when they were given the gift of a daughter.  The apostolic Tradition tells us that when their daughter, Mary, was with child herself, both Joachim and Anne were notified separately by an angel of the Lord of this good news, which was the same way Joseph and Mary both heard the news of the birth of Jesus as well.  Since their daughter was specifically chosen for this special role in the history of salvation, we can only imagine the holiness and example of faith that Anne and Joachim gave her as she grew us as a child and a youth.  We celebrate the lives of Anne and Joachim and the example of faith that they are for us. 

        Last week, when the volunteers from the Eight Days of Hope were here in our parish to help us in our recovery efforts from the tornado that passed through Tupelo at the end of April, a young man from Shreveport, Louisiana who was helping us paint the church engagement me in a lot of questions about Catholicism.  He was from a Baptist background and he wondered why we believe a lot of things in our Catholic faith.  He could not get over that we in the Catholic faith don't go by Scripture alone, but rather have the teachings of the Magisterium and Tradition to help us with what the Church teaches of the faith.  A lot of what we know about Mary and Jesus are filled in by what the Magisterium and Tradition teaches.  Let us celebrate the lives of Anne and Joachim today.  We give thanks for their place in the history of salvation.