Does knowing more about Mary automatically lead to loving her more?
Greater knowledge should lead to greater love, but it’s not automatic. This is one of the early premises of a little known book on Marian devotion written by Fr. William G. Most. The book is called Mary In Our Life.
Starting today, on the Solemnity of Mary’s Assumption I would like to take the opportunity to introduce our readers to some of the keen and practical insights of Fr. Most’s work.
The connection between knowledge and love
As we mentioned earlier, Fr. Most’s first task in teaching us how to live more like Mary is to correct the often misunderstood connection between knowledge and love. He says that many of us have probably heard the maxim, “to know God is to love Him”.
There’s some truth to this statement, Fr. Most affirms, but there is more too it that simple learning. Fr. Most writes, “The more one knows, the more he ought to love God, the more motives he has at his disposal which should urge him on to love.”
The problem lies in that little word “ought”. Our knowledge of God, and likewise, our knowledge of Mary ought to lead us to greater love for them. But this is not automatic, because it involves our freedom. Growth in love arises only when we freely act on the knowledge that we have obtained. Greater knowledge gives us greater motivations to love, but to love in fact demands turning that knowledge into willed acts of love. Fr. Most calls this knowledge turned into acts of love, “realized knowledge”.
He gives the following example to help us better understand what he means by “realized knowledge”.
“Suppose I read in the news that there is a famine in India. I know that fact and accept it without question, yet it probably does not impress me deeply. Were I to go to India, and perhaps even feel hunger myself, I would not merely add new facts and details to my knowledge; what is more important, I would realize my knowledge. We might call my first knowledge “notional knowledge.” The second kind would be “realized knowledge.” The first has little if any effect on our lives; the second is vital.”
Vital knowledge, living love
Thus, “notional knowledge” of Mary will do us no good unless we turn it into “realized knowledge” of her. In other words, we should strive to learn more about Mary, so that we can choose to love her and imitate her more in the concrete circumstances of our life.
But what would happen, asks Fr. Most, if we do the first, but fail to do the second?
“But if this knowledge is to remain merely notional, unrealized, it will do us little good. In fact, it might even be somewhat harmful to us. The reason is simple: in learning these things, we have at hand the motives for greater love of God (for love of Mary is a means to love of God). When God gives us better opportunities, He expects more of us. The greater the talents given us, the greater the return we should make. But if we learn much about God and about Mary and remain untouched by this new knowledge, we are apt to become calloused, hardened, blinded—for we do not respond to motives that ought to fire us with love.”
Thus, if we only learn about Mary, but don’t translate that knowledge into a new attitude, new convictions, and new virtues, then we risk becoming the most pitiable of Mary’s children. As if lamenting our sins were not enough already, we would also lament being cold-hearted lovers of Mary.
I don’t want that, and I’m sure you don’t want that either! So, this is why I propose we follow Fr. Most’s guidance on learning more about Mary in order to turn that knowledge into a greater and more effective love for her.
If up until now you have been a simple reader of this blog and not a doer of what it proposes, I invite you to take a new approach to your reading. Read in order to learn, pray about what you read, and lovingly act on what you have learned in prayer. As Fr. Most writes,
“If love keeps pace with knowledge, the result is an ever-growing, solid spiritual structure; mere knowledge puffs up, but love builds up solidly.”
Seize the day and make it all Hers!
