"Substance of our flesh": why 2nd February should be celebrated as a Marian feast

On 23rd January, the parish in which I serve celebrated its monthly Choral Evensong and anticipated Candlemas with music, readings, and prayers from today's feast. The liturgical purist in me was, of course, somewhat sceptical when the suggestion was first made. It was, however, a very meaningful way - on a dark, cold January evening - to emphasise the significance to the Epiphany season of the feast of the Purification of Saint Mary the Virgin.

It became, in a way, an Evensong of Our Lady during Epiphanytide, with the Magnificat (Stanford in G) and the anthem, 'When to the temple Mary went', beautifully celebrating the role of the Blessed Virgin. This was a fitting recognition of the Marian dimension of Epiphanytide in the traditional one year Eucharistic lectionary. The Blessed Virgin is found in the Gospel readings for the Epiphany, the First Sunday after the Epiphany (the finding in the Temple), and the Second Sunday after the Epiphany (the Miracle at Cana). Epiphanytide no less than Christmastide has a Marian dimension worthy of celebration and contemplation.

This has a profound Christological significance, indicated by the saying of the Athanasian Creed at Mattins on the feast of the Epiphany itself:

and Man, of the Substance of his Mother, born in the world.

The glory witnessed to in the Gospel readings of the Sundays of Epiphanytide (whether in the one or three year lectionary) is revealed in the flesh of the Incarnate Word, flesh "of the Substance of his Mother". The glory manifested at the Lord's Baptism, in the Miracle at Cana, in the signs and wonders in Galilee, is the glory of the Lord manifested in the flesh assumed in the womb of the Blessed Virgin. Thus, when we praise God in the traditional proper preface for the Epiphany (here from the Canadian BCP 1962), we rejoice that the Eternal Word reveals His glory in the substance of our mortal flesh because He is substance of her flesh:

Through Jesus Christ our Lord, who, in substance of our mortal flesh, manifested forth his glory, that he might bring us out of darkness into his own marvellous light. Therefore with Angels, etc.

This also has relevance when we consider Epiphanytide as a season which draws together Christmastide and the forthcoming Paschal cycle of Lent, Holy Week and Easter. The One who fasts and is tempted in the wilderness, whose body is anointed by the woman in preparation for His burial, who weeps at the tomb of Lazarus, who experiences agony in the Garden, who is scourged and pierced, dies and is buried, who rises again on the third day is the Eternal Word who has assumed flesh in the womb of the Blessed Virgin. In other words, Epiphanytide prepares us year by year to enter into the mystery of the Lord's Passion by pointing us to the truth that He "in substance of our mortal flesh, manifested forth his glory". The glory of the Eternal Word revealed "in substance of our mortal flesh" at the Adoration of the Magi, in the River Jordan, at Cana, in the miracles performed in Galilee, is the glory which will be revealed "in substance of our mortal flesh" in the Cross and Resurrection.

It is Epiphanytide which prepares us for this. And it does so by means of a deeply Marian dimension: "and Man, of the Substance of his Mother, born in the world". This is why Candlemas, the feast which draws Epiphanytide to a close, is rightly to be regarded as a Marian feast, celebrating the the reality and fullness of the Incarnation as we prepare to turn towards the Paschal Mysteries. It is only in light of the reality and fullness of the Incarnation that we can grasp the salvific truth of the Cross and Resurrection - and this means confessing the Marian dimension, "And was incarnate by the Holy Ghost of the Virgin Mary".

Describing today's feast, after Cranmer, as the Purification of Saint Mary the Virgin - that is, celebrating it as a Marian feast - points to and helps to secure the Christological truth which is at the heart of the Paschal Mystery, to which we now turn. Denying this Marian title for the feast (as is also the case with the feast of the Annunciation of the Blessed Virgin Mary) obscures the truth of the Incarnation, the truth that requires us to name the Blessed Virgin Mary and so to rejoice that the Eternal Word assumed substance of our flesh for our redemption because He is substance of her flesh.

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