If the world received the body of Christ from this woman, Mary, then women today should not be excluded from giving the body of Christ as priests to the faithful at Mass. Dr. Dorothy Ann Lee

 

MMOJ Celebration of The Assumption of Mary Mother of Jesus, Aug. 17, 2024 Presider: Bridget Mary Meehan and Mary Montavon, Prayer Leaders: Cheryl and Jim Brandi, Readers: Jerry and Sue Bries, IT, Michael Rigdon

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Welcome/Gathering Rite:  

Presider: Mary M.

A warm welcome to Mary Mother of Jesus Inclusive Catholic Community Zoom Liturgy. 

Today we celebrate the Feast of the embodied Mary in heaven.  

With Mary we celebrate  the sacredness of our embodied selves. Let us "untie the strong woman" and recognize divinity in female bodies and in all genders. Let us live Mary's  Magnificat vision of justice and equality to transform oppressive power structures and hierarchies.

Whoever you are, wherever you are, you are welcome at this table in our church without walls. Please have bread and wine/juice in front of you as we pray the Eucharistic Prayer together. 

Opening Song: Blessed is She by Colleen Fulmer

https://youtu.be/P_ZjCQKwYIw

Blessed is she who believed

That the promise made her by our God

Would we fulfilled, would be fulfilled

And Mary said let me sing the praise of God

For having touched this lowly one

And from now on I shall be called woman most highly blessed

Holy is our God whose kindness never ends

Who by great strength has scattered the proud

And raises up the poor and gathers them into all fullness

For God has come to this servant Israel

To show all mercy now and forever as was promised

Sarah and Abraham and the children forever.

Transformation Rite: 

Presider: Bridget Mary

We pause now to affirm the divinity of our embodied selves.  Take a moment to get in touch with the sacredness of your body.  

(Pause briefly and extend your hand over your heart)

Let us open our hearts to Infinite Love moving through every  cell of our bodies.

All: I rejoice in Boundless Love embracing me, and guiding me to healing and wholeness.  Amen, Alleluia! 

Gloria: Please join in praying the Gloria together

Presider: Mary M and ALL:

Glory to the Spirit of Life, for the Divine Mystery in which we live and move and have our being. 

Glory to the Spirit of Life, for the gift of inner peace- peace in our hearts, peace in our thoughts, peace with one another.

Glory to the Spirit of life for Mary, whose Assumption reminds us of the sacredness of our bodies. 

Amen, So be it! Alleluia! 

Opening Prayer

Presider: Bridget Mary

Let us pray:

Holy One, on this Feast of Mary's Assumption, we celebrate the gift of life in our embodied selves. May we -like Mary-  challenge oppressive power structures and hierarchies that devalue women's bodies and humanity. May we- like Mary- be prophetic witnesses of justice for the excluded ones and welcome all to the Banquet Table of your Boundless Love.   

ALL:  So be it!

                                      Liturgy of the Word

Reader: Suzanne Bires

First Reading: A Reading from Untie the Strong Woman by Clarissa Pinkola Estes

This word Memorare, chosen as the first word in the first line of the prayer, doesn’t mean turn back and make some vapid recall, be of fluffy sentiment. It’s not a weak effort to remember. No, this Memorare means Remember! Wake up! It is a command from the soul to remember who you are and what powers have been born into you; that you are the son, the daughter, of Blessed Mother… 

Even as the Great Woman wears “the shirt of arrows” slammed onto her by the ridiculing, the scorning, the opprobrium of the overculture for her relentless stance in protecting all the vulnerable souls of the earth — she continues nonetheless to shelter and to intercede for the spirit of the child in all souls, of any age… 

Who needs protection, who will ever need protection and justice, are the souls of her earthly, vulnerable children, regardless of their number of years lived. The Great Woman’s own Child said it free and clear: Whatever you do to the least of us, you do to Me. 

In this way, the Mother who wears “the shirt of arrows” teaches us that all souls belong under the armor of her starry mantle, cradled beside her precious Little Child. She takes on the protection of all.

 So, despite human failings, our own and/or others’, we continue to chant the Memorare so that all — the sighted and the semi-sighted and the not-yet-sighted, the hearing and the not hearing, the heartful and the not heartless perhaps but rather more accurately the not-yet-heartful — will all be aided in ways that can support them, and us, to be made whole again. 

All are understood as worthy of understanding and mercy. With Blessed Mother, no one is left out. 

These are the inspired words of spiritual teacher Clarissa Pinkola Estes and the community responds to them by saying

All: So be it!

Responsorial Psalm: Magnificat

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0y67GDT2kwU

Reader: Jerry Bires

Second Reading:  

A Reading from Abounding in Kindness by theologian Elizabeth Johnson  (pp.309 -310)

Mary’s canticle finds special resonance in the hearing of women who struggle against sexism as well as against racism, classism, heterosexism, and all other injustice that demeans their humanity. 

They note that this is the longest set of words on the lips of any woman in the whole New Testament, the most any woman gets to say. 

In its spirit, they draw many and varied lessons of encouragement. 

One of the strongest and most unusual lessons in light of traditional Mariology is the right of women to say “no.” 

Leonardo Boff makes the point well: “Men toiling in the service of male power interests represent Mary only as the woman who knew how to say yes.” 

But here she takes on as her own the divine NO to what crushes the lowly. She stands up fearlessly and sings out that injustice will be overturned. 

No passivity here, but solidarity with divine outrage over the degradation of life, coupled with God’s merciful promise to repair the world. 

In the process she bursts out of the boundaries of male-defined femininity while still every inch a woman.

 Singing of her joy in God’s victory over oppression, she becomes not a subjugated but a prophetic woman.

These are the inspired words of theologian Elizabeth Johnson and the community responds to them by saying 

All: So be it. 

Alleluia:  CELTIC ALLELUIA – Linda Lee Miller

https://youtu.be/2ME1cF2iSgE

Gospel Reading: Mary M

   A reading from the Gospel of Luke 1:39 - 56 

Mary didn’t waste a minute. She got up and traveled to a town in Judah in the hill country, straight to Zachariah’s house, and greeted Elizabeth. 

When Elizabeth heard Mary’s greeting, the baby in her womb leaped. 

She was filled with the Holy Spirit and sang out exuberantly.

You’re so blessed among women, and the babe in your womb, also blessed!  

Why am I so blessed that the mother of my Lord visits me?  

The moment the sound of your greeting entered my ears, the babe in my womb skipped like a lamb for sheer joy.  

Blessed woman, who believed what God said and believed every word would come true!

  And Mary said,

I’m bursting with God-news,

I’m dancing the song of my Savior God.

God took one good look at me, and look what happened—I’m the most fortunate woman on earth!

What God has done for me will never be forgotten, the God whose very name is holy, set apart from all others.

God's mercy flows in wave after wave on those who are in awe before the Holy One.  

God scattered the bluffing braggarts. 

 God knocked tyrants off their high horses, pulled victims out of the mud. 

The starving poor sat down to a banquet; the callous rich were left out in the cold.  

God embraced the people.

  

God remembered and piled on the mercies, piled them high. 

It’s exactly what the Holy One promised, beginning with Abraham and Sarah and right up to now.

Mary stayed with Elizabeth for three months and then went back to her own home.

These are the inspired words of the Apostle Luke. And the community responds by saying:

All:  So be it.

(adapted by Bridget Mary from The Message New Testament by Eugene H. Peters)

HOMILY STARTER: Bridget Mary 

Homily Starter for Assumption of Mary- Aug. 17, 2024 -Bridget Mary Meehan

.While the doctrine that Mary Mother of Jesus was bodily taken up to heaven at the end of her earthly life, was not dogmatically defined until 1950 by Pope Pius X11, evidence of this belief can be found in patristic narratives from the third and fourth centuries. The Assumption of Mary was celebrated in the fifth century and became official in the ninth century. In the 21^st century, we can reclaim its liberating message to challenge gender oppression and affirm the sacredness of women’s bodies.  With Mary, we can pray a Magnificat of blessing for a new order of justice and equity for the excluded and marginalized everywhere. 

We live in a world where female bodies are abused, violated and trafficked for profit every day. The World Health Organization reports that globally about 1 in 3 (30%) of women worldwide have been subjected to either physical and/or sexual intimate partner violence or non-partner sexual violence in their lifetime. (WHO,March 25, 2024 )

The significance of Mary’s Assumption affirms that not only Mary’s body is sacred, but all women’s bodies, and the embodied selves of all genders are sacred. Our full humanity reflects our glorious divinity. As we sing in our liturgy: “We are holy, holy, holy!”

In their article entitled “Mary, Mother of God, Mother of the Poor, Latin American theologians Ivone Gebara and Maria Bingemer write:

“Mary’s assumption brings a new and promising future for women…{it} restores and reintegrates women’s bodiliness in the very mystery of God. Starting with Mary, the dignity of women’s condition is recognized and safeguarded by the creator of that very bodiliness. In Jesus Christ and Mary the feminine is respectively resurrected and assumed into heaven – definitively sharing in the glory of the Trinitarian mystery from which all proceeds and to which all returns.”

In the beautiful graphic from the Women’s Ordination Conference citing Dr. Ann Lee at university of Divinity in Australia, the authority of Mary is the basis for the ordination of women priests today. She concludes: “if the world received the body of Christ from this woman, Mary, then women today should not be excluded from giving the body of Christ, as priests, to the faithful at Mass.”

Indian feminist  Kochurani Abraham describes Mary’s Magnificat as bringing about a new vision: “the vision of a new social order based on equality, justice and freedom for all. This new vision would subvert social hierarchies and power structures that are oppressive and this is what we hear foretold in today’s gospel.”  ... This new vision which we call the reign of God would be realized wherever people share, where they love the earth and all is creatures, where they take a stance to include the excluded ones of this world into the table fellowship of life.” (Homily “birthing a new order,”Catholic Women Preach)

 

According to the Synod on Synodality,  the Church must be a Church  for everyone including the marginalized. The means that the institutional Church must subvert hierarchies and male-only power structures in order to foster an inclusive Church of baptized equals.  The good news is that inclusivity is the vision of the emerging Church – the thousands of small faith communities around the world -who are following Jesus example of inviting everyone to an open table to celebrate and receive Eucharist..

 Let us rejoice with Mary and proclaim our own Magnificat as we lovingly bless and offer compassionate care to our sisters and brothers in word and deed! Let us live our prophetic vocation in this community of baptized equals to speak truth to power and to work for justice- trusting that we will have all we need to do what God is calling us to do!

Let us celebrate with Mary our glorious humanity -one in Christ -in the Divine Heart of love!

Community Sharing

Prayer Leader: Jim Brandi Community Statement of Faith

  Together let us profess our Faith. 

We believe in our Creator who has not forgotten us, rather is ever and always present with us.

We believe in Jesus, the Word incarnate, who journeyed on the earth, blessing the sick, making whole the broken, healing many, instilling faith in his followers so that they may continue the work He began.

We believe in Christ, the everlasting Presence in our world in our universe.

We believe in the Spirit of Life, the breath of wisdom Sophia, who stays present and real to us during this great human struggle we face today and in the days ahead.

We believe in the communion of saints, our heavenly friends who walk with us in love as we continue our life journey.

We believe in one another and our individual and collective response to being diligent in following the directives given by medical professionals at this time.

We believe in the partnership and equality of women and men in our Church and our world.  Here we live our prophetic call of Gospel equality.

We believe that kin-dom is here and now, stretched out all around us for those with eyes to see it, hearts to receive it,

and hands to make it happen.

Prayer Leader: Cheryl B

Prayers of the Community

  As we prepare the altars before us to share this sacred meal, we bring to the table our prayers and intentions.

 We bring to the table members of our MMOJ community who are experiencing difficult times for a variety of reasons. May they find peace of mind and heart through our special prayer. 

  We bring to the table all those who serve the needs of others, those who serve our communities, all those who give of themselves locally, whose compassion brings healing of hearts.

  We bring to the table the people of our troubled country, especially those who actively address issues of bigotry and gender injustice of all kinds, may they be heard, may they be listened to, may we all see transformation within ourselves, our communities and our government.

  We bring to the table all women of the world who are mothers and all those who have been “mother” to others. May they be inspired by the life of Mary the mother of Jesus, and may we recognize that the power and Spirit of Mary lives within us, within all genders, always giving us strength and wisdom.

  We bring to the table all members of our MMOJ community; we remember in a special way everyone in our midst who needs to be healed. 

…pause… unmute and share name/s….   

        

may all be healed by the Spirit of Mary, our Blessed Mother.           

We pray for these and any other unspoken intentions.  And together we say:  

So Be It!

Offertory

Presentation of the bread and wine

Presider: Bridget Mary

 God of all life, through your goodness we have bread, wine, all creation, and our own lives to offer. Through this sacred meal we become your new creation.

Presider: Mary M

 O Holy One, You dwell in all of us, and you accept our gifts  that we offer in service to our faith community. We do this in memory of our brother, Jesus. Amen.

Eucharistic Prayer

Prayer Leader: Jim

The Holy One is with you.

Prayer Leader and All: 

And also with you.

Prayer Leader: Cheryl

We lift up our hearts.

Prayer Leader: and All

We lift them up to the Holy One, the Love of our Hearts. 

Prayer Leader: Jim

 We give thanks and praise to our compassionate God.

Prayer Leader and All: It is right to give the Holy One thanks and praise.

 Prayer Leader: Cheryl

 We join with the angels and saints as we sing this joyful song of praise: 

  

Holy, Holy, Holy…

https://youtu.be/orKBBIj5LZA

Presider: Mary M

We celebrate Mary the Mother of Jesus as a liturgical leader who praised God, preached the gospel, led the prayers, and healed with her hands.

During Jesus’s life on earth, he lived and died loving the poor, healing the sick and challenging the injustices within society.  Because of his ministry, Jesus was feared by the authorities of his day, and they sought out ways to bring him to his death.

Invocation of the Holy Spirit (extend you hands in blessing)

 

Presider and All:  Bridget Mary

You bless us O Sacred Spirit and you enliven all that exists. You transform these gifts of bread and wine, and our lives, by boundless grace that nourish and sustains us on our journey. 

 On the night before he faced his own death, Jesus sat at the Seder supper with his companions and friends.  He reminded them of all that he taught them, and to fix that memory clearly with them, he bent down and washed their feet. 

 

(All lift your bread and pray) 

When Jesus returned to his place at the table, he lifted the bread, spoke the blessing, broke the bread, and offered it to them saying: 

Take and eat, this is my very self.  (pause) 

 

Presider Mary M:

(All lift your cup and pray) 

Then Jesus took the cup of the covenant, spoke the grace, and offered it to them saying:

Take and drink.

Whenever you remember me like this,

I am among you.   (pause) 

Prayer Leader Cheryl:

Let us proclaim and live the gospel of justice and peace, remembering that we are bearers of light and hope.

All: Christ of the Cosmos you are the spark of love in whom we believe; the Wisdom of Sophia in whom we trust; and the desire for justice that consumes us.

 Prayer Leader Jim:

Sacred Spirit, we remember Mary, Mother of Humanity, who birthed Jesus into our world. We rejoice that the Universal Christ remains always and ever present within and around us. We remember all those who have transitioned from life on earth to complete union with the Sacred Presence: Mary of Nazareth and all great saints, prophets and martyrs.  

 We remember all the members of our MMOJ Community, our family members and friends who have transitioned into New Life.  

… (Pause and remember the names of your loved ones in silence…)

  

Prayer Leader Cheryl: 

All beloved who have blessed our lives and whose memory continues to inspire us, we remember you.

  We pray that the Holy One renew in our hearts our commitment to journey always in faith and hope as we reach out and support our religious and political leaders, comfort and love those closest to us, those who live in our country and all the people of the earth.

And we respond together by singing the Great Amen.  

Linda Lee Miller

https://youtu.be/0sDDgwZlijc

Presider Mary M:

Prayer of Jesus:

 Let us pray as Jesus taught us:

All: 

O Holy One, who is within, around and among us, 

We celebrate your many names. 

Your Wisdom come, 

Your will be done, unfolding from the depths within us.

Each day you give us all we need. 

You remind us of our limits, and we let go. 

You support us in our power, and we act with courage, 

For you are the dwelling place within us,  

the empowerment around us, 

and the celebration among us, now and forever.  

Amen  

(Miriam Therese Winter) 

      

Presider Mary M:

Sign of Peace: 

Let us offer one another a sign of peace.

Namaste! Namaste! Namaste

Prayer for the Breaking of the Bread

Presider: Bridget Mary 

Please join in praying the prayer for the breaking of the bread:

All: Loving God, You call us to live the Gospel of peace and justice. 

We will live justly.   

Loving God, You call us to be Your presence in the world.  

We will love tenderly.

Loving God, You call us to speak truth to power.  

We will walk with integrity. 

(Presiders hold up bread and wine)

Communion:Ave Maria by Ashana, Video by Mary Theresa Streck

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=79N0w4NcZSY

Prayer After Communion

Presider: Mary M

Let us pray together:  

What we have heard with our ears, we will live with our lives; as we share communion, we become communion, both Love’s nourishment and Love’s challenge. We are the hands and feet of Christ in our world. May it be so Amen

     Prayers of Thanksgiving and Announcements

Blessing:

Presider: Bridget Mary

We together raise our hands as we bless one another.

All: 

May we rejoice in our blessed humanity and divinity!

May we speak truth to power and work for justice and equality.

May we be the face of God- joyful and loving- in our world!

Amen, Alleluia. So be it!

Closing Song:   

Courageous Women – Jan Novotka, Video by Mary Theresa Streck

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x8YdXUl4ZsQ

If you would like to add your prayer request to our MMOJ Community Prayers book,

Please send an email to jmeehan515@aol.com

If you would like to invite another person to attend our liturgy please refer them to www.marymotherofJesus.net where the day’s liturgy is found. Zoom instructions are also included there.