St. Martha – July 29

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St. Martha – July 29

Fr. Paul Sretenovic





Today, July 29, is the Feast of St. Martha, sister of St. Mary
Magdalene and St. Lazarus. We find her in the Scriptures three times,
twice directly and once indirectly.



Mary and Martha in the House of Bethany

Giovanni da Milano
In the first instance, Martha questions Jesus about her sister, who
was sitting listening at the Lord’s feet while Martha was busy
preparing the meal in the Gospel of St. Luke:

“Martha was busy about much serving. She stood and said: ‘Lord hast
thou no care that my sister hath left me alone to serve? Speak to her
therefore, that she help me.’

“And the Lord answering, said to her: ‘Martha, Martha, thou art
careful and art troubled about many things. But one thing is
necessary. Mary has chosen the best part, which shall not be taken
away from her’” (10:40-42).

We also find her questioning Jesus about the death of her brother,
Lazarus, in St. John's Gospel, where she comes to a deeper faith in
the divinity of Christ, much like the example of the Samaritan woman
(John 4:15).
“Martha, therefore, as soon as she heard that Jesus had come, went to
meet him, but Mary sat at home. Martha therefore said to Jesus: ‘Lord,
if thou had been here, my brother would not have died. But now also I
know that whatsoever thou wilt ask of God, God will give it to thee.’

“Jesus said to her: ‘Thy brother shall rise again.’ "Martha said to
him: ‘I know that he shall rise again, in the resurrection at the last
day.’

“Jesus said to her: ‘I am the resurrection and the life. He that
believes in me, although he be dead, shall live. And everyone that
lives and believes in me shall not die forever. Believest thou this?’

“She said to him: ‘Yea, Lord I have believed that thou art Christ the
Son of the living God, who art come into this world’” (11:20-27).
The third instance is a reference to Jesus, shortly before the Holy
Week, when Our Lord had supper at the house of Lazarus along with
Martha and Mary (John 12:1-2). He then stayed as their guest there
that night.
“Jesus, therefore, six days before the pasch, came to Bethany, where
Lazarus had been dead, whom Jesus raised to life. And they made him a
supper there, and Martha served. And Lazarus was one of them that were
at table with Him.”
From there, Our Lord would leave to enter triumphant into Jerusalem on
Palm Sunday. That blessed family would, therefore, provide a place for
Our Lord to rest His head a short while before the most solemn week in
the History of mankind.

In her three reported encounters with Jesus, St. Martha represented
the Three Ways of the Interior Life, as taught by theologians such as
Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, a famous French theologian of the time of Pius
XII.

The Purgative Way is represented in the first encounter, when Martha's
soul is purified of her attachment to her own will by coming to
recognize that "one thing necessary," doing the will of God.

The Illuminative Way is symbolized when Jesus reveals Himself to
Martha before He raises Lazarus from the dead: “I am the resurrection
and the life. He that believes in me, although he be dead, shall live.
And everyone that lives and believes in me shall not die forever.”

The Unitive Way is represented when Jesus stays in the home of His
three friends. Not only does Our Lord physically reside in Martha's
home, but because she has been previously instructed, He finds in her
soul a fit dwelling place through her contemplation of His presence.
It is by doing God's will and receiving the illumination that comes
after fidelity to that Will that we are thus prepared for a similar
gift to the one that St. Martha symbolized.



The Raising of Lazarus by Giotto

Alas, many people never get beyond the first stage in the interior
life. This does not mean that such people lose their souls, but
rather, as Garrigou-Lagrange points out in his masterpiece, Life
Everlasting, persons like these will see in Purgatory the higher place
they would have had in Heaven had they been willing to cooperate with
the grace that God was offering to them to make further progress.
Indeed, they will suffer acutely from this realization.

Whereas St. Martha made a profound act of humility in accepting Jesus'
gentle rebuke in Luke's Gospel, we often do the unthinkable act of
questioning Our Lord's wisdom or convincing ourselves that it is not
the voice of God speaking to our souls after all when His answer is
different from what we want to hear. Imagine if after Jesus had told
Martha that "only one thing is necessary," she had turned around and
walked away sad, like the rich man who had many possessions.

Every soul that is serious about following Our Lord will be visited by
Him to test the purity of his or her intentions. It is then that the
soul makes its choice either for God or for self. It is precisely in
Martha's humility that we find her ascent to the first step of
sanctity, because it is clear that there was a resistance in her
natural dispositions to embrace the will of God, and she needed to
purge it.

Like St. Martha, we should have the humility to face our own defects
and then fight against them. Afterwards, Our Lord will illuminate our
souls showing the way He chose for us to follow, and then, we will
start to be one with Him, that is, united with Him. This mystical
union is a pre-taste of the eternal happiness we will have in Heaven
where He will be “our reward exceedingly great.”





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