Now the Hour Has Come. Gregory the Great: The virgin mother,
when wine was lacking, wanted Jesus to do a miracle. She was at once answered,
“Woman, what have I to do with you?” as if to say plainly, The fact that I can
do a miracle comes to me from my Father, not my mother. For it was from the
nature of his Father that he could do miracles but from the nature of his
mother that he could die. When he was on the cross, then, in dying he
acknowledged his mother whom he commended to the disciple, saying, “Behold your
mother.” And so, when he says, “Woman, what have I to do with you? My hour is
not yet come,” he is in effect saying, In the miracle, which I did not from
your nature, I do not acknowledge you. When the hour of death shall come,
however, I shall acknowledge you as my mother, since it is from you that I can
die. Letter 10.39.
A Devoted Son. Augustine: The good teacher does what he
thereby reminds us ought to be done, and by his own example he instructed his
disciples that care for their parents ought to be a matter of concern to pious
children, as if that tree to which the members of the dying One were affixed
were the very chair of office from which the Master was imparting instruction.
From this salutary doctrine it was that the apostle Paul had learned what he
taught in turn, when he said, “But if any does not provide for his own, and
especially for those of his own house, he has denied the faith and is worse
than an infidel.” And what are so much home concerns to anyone, as parents to
children or children to parents? Of this most wholesome precept, therefore, the
very Master of the saints set the example from himself, when—not as God for the
handmaid whom he had created and governed but as a man for the mother of whom
he had been created and whom he was now leaving behind—he provided to a certain
degree another son in place of himself. Tractates on the Gospel of John 119.2.
Honoring One’s Parents. Cyril of Alexandria: Christ here wanted
to confirm the commandment that is clearly emphasized in the Law: “Honor your
father and mother that it may be well with you.” … Honoring one’s parents is
surely a very precious virtue. And how else would we learn the importance of that
love—even when we are overwhelmed by a flood of intolerable calamities—except
by this primary example that Christ offers us? It is one thing to be mindful of
the holy commandments in times of peace and quietness and quite another to fulfill
your duty during the storms and troubles of life. Commentary on the Gospel of
John 12.
A Tradition About
Mary Living with John. The Passing of Mary: Therefore, when the Lord and
Savior Jesus Christ was hanging on the tree fastened by the nails of the cross
for the life of the whole world, he saw about the cross his mother standing,
and John the Evangelist, whom he peculiarly loved above the rest of the
apostles because he alone of them was a virgin in the body. He gave him,
therefore, the charge of holy Mary, saying to him, “Behold your mother!” And he
said to her, “Behold your son!” From that hour the holy mother of God remained
especially in the care of John, as long as she lived. And when the apostles had
divided the world by lot for preaching, she settled in the house of his parents
near Mount Olivet. The Passing of Mary 1. (John 11-21, ed.
Joel C. Elowsky [Ancient Christian Commentary on Scripture; Downers Grove,
Ill.: InterVarsity Press, 2007], 319-20)
