The sermon for July 2 was based on Luke 1:39-47.

Grace to you and peace from God our Father and from our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Amen.

As, in anticipation of today's sermon, I meditated on this weeks readings, the hymn that kept running through my mind was "Blest be the Tie that Binds". It's a hymn that I love for a lot of reasons and one that is especially suited to the themes that run through today's festival. Today we celebrate Elizabeth's visit with the Blessed Virgin immediately following the Annunciation.

Today's lessons are heavily feminine and, as such, they are focused primarily on interpersonal relationships. Today we see the ties between cousins, creatures and fellow believers. We see the bonds between God and His people and between the Church and her Lord.

We experience the ties that bind us in different ways at different times. Sometimes we feel very bound by our relationships. It isn't coincidence that husbands will occasionally, if unadvisedly, refer to their wives as the old ball and chain. That feeling runs the other way too. Sometimes though the ties that bind us can feel like the thinnest of strands under the greatest of stress. Consider the tears of mothers lined up for the first day of school, their womanly hearts already feeling the eventual emptiness of the nest. Sometimes a shackle, sometimes a thread.

The most powerful and effective ties though are like gravity. They are almost imperceptible. We have to be told about them because they don't even seem to exist and we can scarcely imagine what life would be like without them and yet they have a tremendous capacity to hold us together. Like gravity, it takes a colossal intentional effort to break the ties that most perfectly bind us together. And like gravity, the absence of those ties is exciting for a moment, maybe even a little frightening, but weakness and atrophy set in at once and decay is a part of it.

Let's just take one single concrete example of a truth that ties us together. Sticking with our theme of universal constants and heavenly bodies, let's consider our own bodies, some of which seem a little less heavenly than they used to be. Here is one simple truth that is so obvious that we need to be reminded of it. Our bodies are not our own. I'll say it again. Your body is not your own. You didn't create it. You don't own it. It is not yours to do with as you please. That you body is not your own is as counterintuitive as the fact that the earth revolves around the sun.

It is no less true. A lot of our modern ideas about how we should relate to one another are based on the false idea that we own our own bodies. For the whole history of the world until the last few hundred years people knew this fact. In our day we deny it vehemently. It is unpopular with all kinds of groups and it is absolutely anathema to the feminists and post-feminists. The idea that we own our bodies is what underlies such horrors as legalized abortion, physician assisted suicide, no-fault divorce, and same sax-marriages. We are bound to one another even in our skin.

It is true for each of us, every man, woman and child is bound body and soul to every other man, woman and child. We are neither the owners nor the masters of ourselves. We like to think we are and we love to insist that we can make our own decisions and do as we please, especially within the imaginary sanctuary of our own skins but Jesus teaches us otherwise. Who of you can stop yourself from aging? Who here can make himself taller? Who here can actually cause himself to grow more hair? (I'd actually be interested in that if there's anyone who can.) You see? None of us is in complete control of his own flesh since none of us has complete ownership of it.

This is true for everyone but in our lessons for today and in our common experience as well it is especially true for women. Elizabeth was an old women to whom God had denied children for years only to be treated to the rigors of pregnancy in her old age. Mary was a woman whom God impregnated with His only begotten Son by means of the Angelic proclamation. Their bodies were co-opted by God for His own use quite apart from anything they intended for themselves. The same is true for all women everywhere. A woman's body belongs to her husband as Sts. Peter and Paul make perfectly clear. And it amazes me that they should need to clarify that for us in the first place since, in the case of women in particular, we see with our own eyes that their bodies are not their own. How can you claim that your body is your own when you have an entirely separate person living in it? Who, in their right mind would claim that her body is her own when she can hear a heart beat not her own, feel someone else kicking within her and, in modern times, see pictures of that completely other person living in her womb? Of course our bodies are not our own. If you have someone else living in you, you are not your own. You are not your own even if you aren't pregnant and we'll talk about that in a minute.

Without faith the fact that we do not even own our own bodies feels like a chain around us, a burden on our freedom and an impediment to our joy. That's why people get divorced, cheat on one another, and turn the god-given roles of men and women on their heads. Without faith the ties that bind us together are burdens. Those who have faith, however, can experience these ties in different ways. Sometimes we let our old sinful flesh have its way with us and we feel trapped in our relationships too. But when the Holy Ghost has His way with us we feel very differently. The faithful rejoice in their binding ties. We gather together and eat together and pray together. We visit one another in the hospitals and reach out even to those who don't yet know they are connected to us. We find strength in our relationships and strength for our relationships. Where the unbeliever is imprisoned by his fellow men the Christian is embraced by them.

Mary became the Mother of God because she believed what the angel told her. Elizabeth believed the promise of God and became a mother after it was impossible for her to do so. Their husbands believed God's Word and were blessed too. They did not struggle against the Word of God. They did not assert their imaginary independence but rather said to their Lord "Thy Will be Done". They accepted the truth that they were not their own masters and they were blessed in miraculous ways. Men and women of faith are always blessed when they recognize and obey God.

You are not your own. You belong to God. He has called you by name, baptized you and taken up residence in your body and soul. His Holy Spirit dwells within you and you are His. No one who has someone else living in Him can claim to be his own master and that goes for you. You have His Holy Spirit mingled with yours. His blood is in your veins and His flesh clings to your bones. On top of that He has given you to other people as well. Wives belong to their husbands as our Epistle makes perfectly clear. Men belong to their wives and to the authorities God has put over them, and you can ask the nice people at the selective service board whether they are serious about that ownership. Children very clearly belong to their parents. Citizens belong to one another. Christians belong to Christ. Peace and harmony, of the kind we want in our lives comes from accepting this fact and living accordingly. We know we have accepted the truth when we are able to say with sincerity, "not my will but Thine be done". When we can admit that we are beholden not only to God but those people whom God has rightfully placed over us we are on the road to tranquility.

Women are especially called upon to model this kind of obedience in the home. St. Peter continues his instruction to wives in the verses that follow today's epistle by saying that women are to be "submissive to their own husbands, as Sarah obeyed Abraham, calling him lord." In the next verse he gives very different but compatible instruction to men. "Husbands, likewise, dwell with them with understanding, giving honor to the wife, as to the weaker vessel, and as being heirs together of the grace of life." Women are to model obedience and grace in the home and men are to be models of obedience and grace in public. Scripture leaves no room for disobedient wives or lawless husbands. But it offers the possibility of a gracious life for both.

A gracious life is one in which a man or woman or a married couple wear lightly the ties that bind them to their other people in their lives. Our relationships to one another, our respective roles in the world are, as I said earlier, like gravity. They are just right for us, whether we think so or not. We may be able to perform certain stunts without them but it won't be long until we become sick and weak and unable to endure relationships any more. And we may long for other relationships or for a different lot in life than the one God has given us but, like fighter pilots who experience many times the usual force of gravity, we would be contorted and restricted and eventually unable to remain conscious. Whether you are a woman who must obey her husband or a man who must obey the law or a child who must obey his parents and school masters, we are all hemmed in. Whether we experience that as a hedge or a hug depends on whether or not we have faith in God and His goodness. It is to the Church, to you and I, that our Lord speak in the Old Testament Lesson from Canticles. Rise up, my love, my fair one, and come away. For lo, the winter is past, the rain is over and gone. The flowers appear on the earth; the time of singing has come, and the voice of the turtledove is heard in our land." Christ has forgiven our sins, taken up residence in us and knit us into a single family with God as our Father, knit from the very ties that bind. Amen.

The Peace of God, which passes all understanding, keep your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus. Amen.

Last Updated: 5/27/2009