MEMORIAL OF STS.

JOACHIM AND ANNE,

PARENTS OF MARY (JULY 26, 2019)
INTRODUCTION
It was in the home of Joachim and Ann where the Virgin Mary received her
training to be the Mother of God. Thus, devotion to Ann and Joachim is an
extension of the affection Christians have always professed toward our
Blessed Mother. We, too, owe a debt of gratitude to our parents for their help
in our Christian formation.

Our information about Mary's parents comes from an apocryphal Christian

writing, the Gospel of James, written about the year 170. According to this
story, Joachim was a prominent and respected man who had no children, and
he and his wife, Anne, looked upon this as a punishment from God. In answer
to their prayers, Mary was born and was dedicated to God at a very early age.
From this early Christian writing have come several of the feast days of Mary,
particularly the Immaculate Conception, the Nativity of Mary, and her
Assumption into Heaven. Very early also came feast days in honor of SS.
Joachim and Anne, and in the Middle Ages numerous churches, chapels, and
confraternities were dedicated to St. Anne. The couple early became models
of Christian marriage, and their meeting at the Golden Gate in Jerusalem has
been a favorite subject of Christian artists.

Anne is often shown in paintings with Jesus and Mary and is considered a
subject that attracts attention, since Anne is the grandmother of Jesus. We
know little else about the lives of Mary's parents, but considering the person
of Mary, they must have been two very remarkable people to have been
given such a daughter and to have played so important a part in the work of
the Redemption.

COLLECT PRAYER
O Lord, God of our Fathers, who bestowed on Saints Joachim and Anne this
grace, that of them should be born the Mother of your incarnate Son, grant,
through the prayers of both, that we may attain the salvation you have
promised to your people. Through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son, who lives
and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever.
FIRST READING: Ecclesiasticus 44:1, 10-15
Now will I praise those godly men, our ancestors, each in his own time: These
were godly men whose virtues have not been forgotten; Their wealth
remains in their families, their heritage with their descendants; Through
God's covenant with them their family endures, their posterity, for their
sake. And for all time their progeny will endure, their glory will never be
blotted out; Their bodies are peacefully laid away, but their name lives on
and on. At gatherings their wisdom is retold, and the assembly proclaims
their praise.

RESPONSORIAL PSALM: Ps 132:11, 13-14, 17-18

R. The Lord has chosen Zion for his dwelling.

The LORD has chosen Zion;

he prefers her for his dwelling.
“Zion is my resting place forever;
in her will I dwell, for I prefer her.”

“In her will I make a horn to sprout forth for David;

I will place a lamp for my anointed.
His enemies I will clothe with shame,
but upon him my crown shall shine.”

ALLELUIA: See Lk 2:25c

They yearned for the comforting of Israel, and the Holy Spirit rested upon
them.

GOSPEL: 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."

SAINTS JOACHIM AND ANNE’S STORY

In the Scriptures, Matthew and Luke furnish a legal family history of Jesus,
tracing ancestry to show that Jesus is the culmination of great promises. Not
only is his mother’s family neglected, we also know nothing factual about
them except that they existed. Even the names Joachim and Anne come from
a legendary source written more than a century after Jesus died.

The heroism and holiness of these people however, is inferred from the
whole family atmosphere around Mary in the Scriptures. Whether we rely
on the legends about Mary’s childhood or make guesses from the
information in the Bible, we see in her a fulfillment of many generations of
prayerful persons, herself steeped in the religious traditions of her people.

The strong character of Mary in making decisions, her continuous practice

of prayer, her devotion to the laws of her faith, her steadiness at moments of
crisis, and her devotion to her relatives—all indicate a close-knit, loving
family that looked forward to the next generation even while retaining the
best of the past.

Joachim and Anne—whether these are their real names or not—represent

that entire quiet series of generations who faithfully perform their duties,
practice their faith, and establish an atmosphere for the coming of the
Messiah, but remain obscure.

REFLECTION
This is the “feast of grandparents.” It reminds grandparents of their
responsibility to establish a tone for generations to come: They must make
the traditions live and offer them as a promise to little children. But the feast
has a message for the younger generation as well. It reminds the young that
older people’s greater perspective, depth of experience, and appreciation of
life’s profound rhythms are all part of a wisdom not to be taken lightly or
ignored.

The Mysterious Relics of Saint Anne

On Easter AD 792, Charlemagne discovered the relics of Saint Anne with the
help of a deaf handicapped boy. It’s a wonderful tale for this feast day of Saint
Anne.

Below is the account, preserved in the correspondence of Pope Saint Leo III,
concerning the mysterious discovery of the relics of Saint Anne in the
presence of the Emperor Charlemagne.
Fourteen years after Our Lord’s death, Saint Mary Magdalen, Saint Martha,
Saint Lazarus, and the others of the little band of Christians who were piled
into a boat without sails or oars and pushed out to sea to perish — in the
persecution of the Christians by the Jews of Jerusalem — were careful to
carry with them the tenderly loved body of Our Lady’s mother. They feared
lest it be profaned in the destruction, which Jesus had told them was to come
upon Jerusalem. When, by the power of God, their boat survived and finally
drifted to the shores of France, the little company of saints buried Saint
Anne’s body in a cave, in a place called Apt, in the south of France. The
church, which was later built over the spot, fell into decay because of wars
and religious persecutions, and as the centuries passed, the place of Saint
Anne’s tomb was forgotten.

The long years of peace, which Charlemagne’s wise rule gave to southern
France, enabled the people to build a magnificent new church on the site of
the old chapel at Apt. Extraordinary and painstaking labor went into the
building of the great structure, and when the day of its consecration arrived
[Easter Sunday, 792 A.D.], the beloved Charlemagne, little suspecting what
was in store for him, declared himself happy indeed to have journeyed so
many miles to be present for the holy occasion. At the most solemn part of
the ceremonies, a boy of fourteen, blind, deaf and dumb from birth — and
usually quiet and impassive — to the amazement of those who knew him,
completely distracted the attention of the entire congregation by becoming
suddenly tremendously excited. He rose from his seat, walked up the aisle to
the altar steps, and to the consternation of the whole church, struck his stick
resoundingly again and again upon a single step.

His embarrassed family tried to lead him out, but he would not budge. He
continued frantically to pound the step, straining with his poor muted senses
to impart a knowledge sealed hopelessly within him. The eyes of the people
turned upon the emperor, and he, apparently in spired by God, took the
matter into his own hands. He called for workmen to remove the steps.

A subterranean passage was revealed directly below the spot, which the
boy’s stick had indicated. Into this pas sage the blind lad jumped, to be
followed by the emperor, the priests, and the workmen.
They made their way in the dim light of candles, and when, farther along the
pas sage, they came upon a wall that blocked further advance, the boy signed
that this also should be removed. When the wall fell, there was brought to
view still another long, dark corridor. At the end of this, the searchers found
a crypt, upon which, to their profound wonderment, a vigil lamp, alight and
burning in a little walled recess, cast a heavenly radiance.

As Charlemagne and his afflicted small guide, with their companions, stood
be fore the lamp, its light went out. And at the same moment, the boy, blind
and deaf and dumb from birth, felt sight and hearing and speech flood into
his young eyes, his ears, and his tongue.

“It is she! It is she!” he cried out. The great emperor, not knowing what he
meant, nevertheless repeated the words after him. The call was taken up by
the crowds in the church above, as the people sank to their knees, bowed in
the realization of the presence of something celestial and holy.

The crypt at last was opened, and a casket was found within it. In the casket
was a winding sheet, and in the sheet were relics, and upon the relics was an
inscription that read, “Here lies the body of Saint Anne, mother of the
glorious Virgin Mary.” The winding sheet, it was noted, was of eastern design
and texture.

Charlemagne, overwhelmed, venerated with profound gratitude the relics of

the mother of Heaven’s Queen. He remained a long time in prayer. The
priests and the people, awed by the graces given them in such abundance
and by the choice of their countryside for such a heavenly manifestation, for
three days spoke but rarely, and then in whispers.

The emperor had an exact and detailed account of the miraculous finding
drawn up by a notary and sent to Pope Saint Leo III, with an accompanying
letter from himself. These documents and the pope’s reply are preserved to
this day. Many papal bulls have attested, over and over again, to the
genuineness of Saint Anne’s relics at Apt.