Do you see what love can do?

May 31, Tuesday, Seventh Week of Easter
Daily Readings: Romans 12:9-16; Gospel: Luke 1:39-56

It's God's love that has saved us. Mary's genuine love for her cousin, Elizabeth, is an example of love for us all.

Because of love, Mother Mary,  it took an effort to visit her old cousin Elizabeth, who was conceiving a son in her sixth month. She traveled from Nazareth to a town in Judah, like, from Luneta, Manila, to Tarlac in the Philippines, a distance of about 150 kilometers! Do you see what love can do?

She wanted to express her love and support for her older cousin, who had been barren before. Her expression of love is clearly described in today's First Reading from the Letter of St. Paul to the Romans: "Let love be sincere; love one another with mutual affection; anticipate one another in showing honor."

Upon Mama Mary's greeting, Elizabeth was amazed that even "the infant leaped in her womb..." I can imagine the two women embracing each other tightly, with so much happiness for each other. And Elizabeth acknowledged her younger cousin with profound gratitude by saying: "Blessed are you who believed that what was spoken to you by the Lord would be fulfilled."

God has genuinely manifested His love for Mama Mary and Elizabeth, and most of all, He has shown His love for us and our salvation. Because of the movement of love that Mama Mary had witnessed with Elizabeth, she began praising and proclaiming the greatness of God.

Her "Magnificat" is the very expression of her love for God and the accurate description of God's faithfulness to His promise: "He has come to the help of his servant Israel, for he has remembered his promise of mercy, the promise he made to our fathers, to Abraham and his children forever."

Therefore, in the end, the whole picture is: It is God who has visited us because of love! And Mama Mary is the very instrument of such love because of her Son, Jesus.

Do you see the power of love? Let us adopt Mother Mary's loving attitude toward one another.