There is a reason why the Kardiotissa Icon of the Mother of God weeps in Taylor.
It is because the Queen of Heaven weeps, and this miraculous icon — her instrument and reflection — participates in her anguish, and emits actual tears.
Undoubtedly, you have experienced this. If you haven’t yet, then you need to make a pilgrimage to St George’s in Taylor, Pennsylvania. Do not wait for the icon to come to you. As a humble pilgrim, seeking grace, you should go to it, and let the journey become part of your prayer.
But the main point remains. This myrrh-streaming icon weeps because the Theotokos weeps, even in the bliss of her resurrection.
And that should strike you as a poignant, heartbreaking contradiction.
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When the Virgin Mary fell asleep, which is exactly what “dormition” means, she willingly surrendered her soul to her Son and her Lord. You can see this in the icon of this feast: her body lies in repose upon a couch. All the Apostles have gathered close beside her. St Peter is censing her with the kadillo. St Paul is bowing before her.
And behind the Theotokos is Christ in the center, arrayed in golden garments and surrounded by the angels. The bluish tone of the almond-shaped mandorla tells you that this is a moment when the world of heaven has flowed, like a wave, into this life. Christ with His angels appears very much like He will on the Last Day — though at the Dormition (unlike the Last Day) He remains hidden from the physical world. Christ holds a babe in swaddling clothes, just like at His Nativity, though this time the babe is the soul of His mother.
Three days later, Mary was resurrected. When St Thomas and the other Apostles came to reverence her body, they discovered that the tomb was empty. The Theotokos became the first creature to cross over the boundary of the Last Day, the Judgment and the Resurrection.
Her Dormition and Resurrection indicate some important truths. First, even though she was free of personal sin (and so was the Forerunner, John the Baptist), she was still under the curse of the Fall of humanity. The Virgin Mary was born into nature that was subject to the certainty of death — the same nature shared by all humans.
But against the powerful force of sin in this fallen world, Mary willingly chose and worked to become the “handmaiden of the Lord.” God had foreordained her indeed to become “Theotokos,” the “God-bearer.” But Mary always had the complete freedom to refuse, to run away. Instead, she said “be it unto me according to Your word.”
As a result of God’s decision and Mary’s cooperation, the Holy Spirit completely filled her, and brought to her the Son of God in His fullness.
Using some of the terminology from our revivalist friends, Mary became the very first to accept Jesus as her personal Lord and Savior, and invited Him thus into her heart (which is exactly what the Platytera Icon shows).
Mary, more than any other human before or since, became completely filled with the Holy Spirit. Because of this, we do not hesitate to call her “All Pure,” “Most Holy,” “Undefiled.”
Mary did in fact undergo a normal death like everyone else in the human race. This fact alone should contradict any notion of an “immaculate conception.” But contrary to everyone else in the human race, and indeed, all physical creation, Mary’s body did not remain in death. And instead of her soul remaining in Paradise with all the Saints, she was resurrected, and was raised above all creation. At her Dormition, God raised Mary to the highest point where Creation meets the Uncreated, the divinity of the Holy Trinity.
The fallen world could no longer contain her body, so holy it was. That is the simple reason why there are no relics of the Virgin Mary’s body to be found.
This fact of her utter singularity is exactly why we call her “Queen of Heaven.” She is indeed “more honorable than the Cherubim, and beyond compare more glorious than the Seraphim.”
In her position, she is the petitioner to Christ for the entire human race. In the Gospel of St John (which shows, all the way through, the clear influence of the Virgin Mary’s closeness to the beloved disciple), the Miracle of Cana is most significantly a sign of her intercession for the crying needs of humanity and all creation. This is why we call to her with the same address as we do to the Saviour: “Most Holy Theotokos, save us.” We never say this to the Saints: we say, instead, “pray to God for us.” We call no one else “Mediatrix,” as she is addressed in our hymns (particularly the Theotokion of the third tone).
She stands alone on the discos (i.e., the “paten”) at the right hand of the Lamb (the cubicle portion of bread that will become the Body of Christ in Liturgy). This is a mystical sign of her intercessory prayers for the world, even now.
As the Theotokos was raised to the heights of Resurrection and beyond all Judgment, she stands at the right hand of Christ — again, this relationship is displayed on the discos in Liturgy; it is also shown in icons of the Last Judgment. At this place of exaltation, she joins her Son and her Lord as He reigns as King. At the Ascension, He sat down at the right hand of the Father, and from that moment until He returns in the Second Coming, He reigns as King.
But here, it must be kept in mind that the present millennial reign of Christ is not the accomplished kingdom. Even though the descending New Jerusalem is drawing ever closer, it has not descended yet.
This is hugely important, because Christ reigns specifically to overcome the work of the Antichrist, and to struggle against evil. Creation — especially humanity — suffers much because of the spirit of antichrist, evil and the effects of the Fall.
What is most amazing at this point is the fact that Christ still suffers with His creation. Did not the Risen Christ say to Paul, on the road to Damascus “I am Jesus, Whom you are persecuting” (Acts 9.5)? He suffers as He fights (and wins) against evil through His Body, the Church … through us. What we experience, He suffers.
Christ suffers. So does His Mother.
We should not be stymied by the apparent contradiction between the bliss of Heaven, the divine fellowship of the Trinity, which Christ experiences (and by grace, so does the Theotokos) on one hand: and on the other, the suffering that comes from fellowship with creation. This apparent contradiction is called an “antimony,” and is only contradictory to our limited understanding, our “small-mindedness.” But in the point of view of heaven, there is no reason why bliss and suffering cannot go hand in hand, in this age before the Last Day.
The suffering of the Queen of Heaven is not the same as suffering in the fallen world, as “those who grieve who have no hope” (1 Thessalonians 4.13). Her suffering is in full understanding of the infinite power and love of her Son. She sees Him “face to face.” So there is no despondency or darkness — the hopelessness and anxiety that often affects our suffering in this world.
But she, in the presence and ministry of her Son, is fully acquainted with the pain of this world. How could she not grieve for children who starve, who waste away in disease, who are extinguished before they take a single breath of air at birth? How could she not suffer for the persecution of Christians all over the world? For the oppression of the poor and the weak and the powerless? For the sick and the wounded, the captive and enslaved? For victims of violence and sexual transgression? For the abuse of all the small, the innocent who have no voice?
These are all her children — because if Christ called her “Mother,” and if we are His Body, then is she not our Mother as well?
She weeps for her own when her own are in pain.
In one of his many blessed conversations with St Silouan, Archimandrite Sophrony asked the saint what and who he should pray for. This is what the Russian Athonite said in reply:
He who has the Holy Spirit in him, to however slight a degree, sorrows day and night for all mankind. His heart is filled with pity for all God’s creatures, more especially for those who do not know God, or who resist Him and therefore are bound in torment. For them, more than for himself, he prays day and night, that all may repent and know the Lord (Archimandrite Sophrony, Saint Silouan the Athonite).
This is truest of the person of the Queen of Heaven and fulfilled perfectly in her. In the bliss of the Resurrection, and in the Spirit of her Son, her heart indeed is filled with pity for all humanity, and indeed, all creation, great and small. She prays for presidents and prime ministers. She prays for the small beasts and children. She prays for the mountains and the seas, and the smallest garden. That is why we associate flowers with her, especially at the Dormition: they all rejoice, in their loveliness, for her love.
Love suffers for the sake of the other. Love cannot be restrained.
The starets Zosima said this about love to Alyosha, in his last days in The Brothers Karamazov by Fyodor Dostoevsky:
Love all creation, the whole of it and every grain of sand within it. Love every leaf, every ray of God’s light. Love the animals, love the plants, love everything. If you love everything, you will perceive the divine mystery in all things … Everything, like the ocean, flows and enters into contact with everything else: touch one place, and you set up a movement at the other end of the world.
There is no such thing as love without suffering, without giving your heart away. Until the Last Day when Jesus returns and the Holy Spirit transfigures all creation, it cannot be any other way: Christ the King, and His mother the Queen and all the saints, will feel the pain of the fallen world, and suffer in intercession.
This, the Theotokos, knows more than anyone else.
So next time you see the streaming myrrh of the Kardiotissa (that is, “of the heart”) icon, remember this:
Those are the very tears of the Queen of Heaven, who suffers in bliss.
She weeps for love.