The Feast of Saints Joachim and Anne, Monday, July 26, 2021

Matthew 13:16-17

Jesus said to his disciples: “Blessed are your eyes, because they see, and your ears, because they hear.  Amen, I say to you, many prophets and righteous people longed to see what you see but did not see it, and to hear what you hear but did not hear it.”

According to The Proto-Gospel of James, which scholars say was written around the year 150 A.D., there was was a very devout man named Joachim, wealthy in livestock.  He grieved, however, that he and his wife, Anne, had no children.  One day, in terrible desperation, he went out to the wilderness and vowed to stay there until God heard his prayer and sent him a sign that he would become a father: “I will not go down either for food or for drink until the Lord my God shall look upon me, and prayer shall be my food and drink.”  Anne, meanwhile suffered the double blow of present childlessness and imminent widowhood.  She lamented, “Alas! To what have I been likened? I am not like the birds of heaven, because even the birds of heaven are productive before you, O Lord. Alas! To what have I been likened? I am not like the beasts of the earth, because even the beasts of the earth are productive before you, O Lord. Alas! To what have I been likened? I am not like these waters, because even these waters are productive before you, O Lord. Alas! To what have I been likened? I am not like this earth, because even the earth brings forth its fruits in season, and blesses you, O Lord!”  Visits by angels to Joachim and Anne assure them that God has heard their prayer and that they will have a child.  Anne declares that the child she bears will be dedicated to God, whether it be a boy or a girl.  The child she bears she names “Mary”.

We know from the Jewish writings from the first century B.C., such as the Books of Enoch and texts among the Dead Sea Scrolls that at the time of the Lord Jesus’s Birth in Bethlehem, anticipation for the Messiah was at fever pitch.  The Pharisees had drawn up a list of qualifications by which they would (they thought) recognize him.  Various men had arisen and made great claims for themselves and formed followings, but nothing had come of them.  When the Lord did come he was recognized by great crowds, but hardly by a majority of the Jews.  Yet, those who did recognize him as their Savior rejoiced in him.  “Blessed are your eyes, because they see, and your ears, because they hear.”  The Lord confirms the Apostles in their hopes, and also calls them “blessed” because they not only see him, but they know who he is.  “Amen, I say to you, many prophets and righteous people longed to see what you see but did not see it, and to hear what you hear but did not hear it.”  The Lord is telling his Apostles, in these words, what it means that they are blessed: the great prophets and the righteous of the ages yearned to see and hear what they were seeing and hearing, but did not.  They, the Apostles, and not those.

Joachim and Anne had the great joy of becoming the parents of a child conceived without original sin, and who would not commit any sin.  She would herself be visited by an angel, and this angel would stand in awe of her.  She would become the Mother of God.  We honor the Blessed Virgin’s faithful parents, whose virtue and righteousness gave her good example and prepared her for the holiness that was to be hers.