Have you ever met someone who seemed to you to be good to the bone? Someone whose presence is desired, whose words are filled with prudence, whose actions are wise, whose kindness is genuine and consistent, whose intelligence is keen? Someone who knows the right thing to do and is a joy to be around? Someone whose compassion conveys the healing touch of genuinely caring about the sufferings of others? Someone whose virtue has been tested and proven?
Don't we all know at least one person who strikes us as one of the finest people we've ever met? How does a person get to be like that?
That's what this Solemnity of the Immaculate Conception is about. A lot of people think this feast is celebrating the Virginal Conception of Jesus, but it's rather the doctrine, infallibly defined, that Mary was conceived without sin. In other words, Mary's "Yes" was a result of grace. Mary was the extraordinary one who was able to cooperate with the plan of God in such a way that her "Yes" opened the way for the mysteries of the Incarnation, Redemption and Salvation found in the Word Incarnate, Jesus the only mediator between God and man.
The incredible people we have met in life, the saints they we have journeyed with, the lights in our lives, the beacons of hope whom we have known and been inspired by, are that way because of grace. It's not their own doing. They are able to get themselves out of the way so grace can flow more purely. Mary's title of the Immaculate Conception is a reminder that all the good that comes forth from a human being is not his or her own doing. It is a result of grace, and the grace of being open to the effect of grace upon the choices we make in life. We are always free to reject that grace; and most of do, many times. But, oh how wonderful it is when we know someone who cooperates with God's grace consistently. Like Mary.
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