Blessed Guerric of Igny

ALL GENERATIONS WILL CALL HER BLESSED
From a sermon by Blessed Guerric of Igny 7
◊◊◊

“Mary has chosen the best part.” This was said of Mary, the sister of
Martha, but it was realized… with greater fullness and holiness in Mary, Mother of
the Lord. For… the blessed Virgin Mary chose the best part; or rather she entered…
into unending possession of what she had chosen long before: to keep close to the
Lord, to be inseparable from him, and to enjoy God’s Word for all eternity.

After her Son ascended to where he was before, the mother, released from
all temporal anxiety and more fully enlightened by the Holy Spirit, rejoiced to be
still and see that Jesus is God. A vision of wholly ineffable joy and supreme delight
for all who love Jesus, but before all others for her who gave birth to Jesus. As the
grace of giving birth to God was conferred on her apart from all others, so was the
privilege of glorying in him to whom she gave birth. Altogether her own and
without comparison was the glory of the Virgin Mother, to see God the King of all
in the diadem of the flesh with which she crowned him, so as to recognize God and
adore him in her own body and see her own body glorified in God. These are the
truths which in the meantime Mary rejoiced to contemplate, this is the best part
which she has chosen, which… has not been taken away from her but brought to
perfection in her. For since she was not careless or remiss in Martha’s work she
has not been left without Mary’s fruit. Toil is in action, fruit or reward in
contemplation.

We say these things to you, brethren, so that if you feel a desire for that best
part which is praised in Mary, you may know that it is the reward of the one who
cannot be reproached for failing to do Martha’s part: it is not right that reward
should be sought before merit. It behooves Jacob first to be united with Leah
before enjoying Rachel’s embraces; and he himself has to be called and to be Jacob
before becoming Israel. “If they will make you master of the feast,” says the Wise
Man, “make good provision for the guests, and so take your place among them; your
duty done, recline at ease and rejoice on their account and receive the crown that
marks their favor.” The toil involved in work or the anxieties of administration are
seeds of justice, through which joys are to be reaped from the fruit of consoling
mercy. For so the Prophet says: “Sow for yourselves in justice, reap from the fruit of
mercy”. But one who sows sparingly will also reap sparingly; and one who sows
with a blessing will also reap with a blessing.

No one to be sure sowed with so generous a blessing as she who was blessed
among women and brought forth blessed seed from her womb. So let Mary reap
her blessings; let her who sowed the blessing of all nations receive in a way all her
own the blessing of all nations. “All generations,” she says, “will call me blessed.”

7
“Fourth Sermon for the Assumption,” Liturgical Sermons, vol. 2 (Cistercian Fathers Series 32),
Spencer MA: Cistercian Publications, 1971, pp. 186-191.