Reflection on the Feast of the Immaculate Conception

When I was about 9 and my mother was pregnant and told me she was carrying a child in her womb, all of a sudden I recognized the word womb in the Hail Mary. I had never paid attention. I had never asked, but there it was, womb, a very personal body part. Blessed be the fruit of thy womb, Jesus. And about two years later, when I learned about sex, I was deeply embarrassed to realize how directly and how frequently the Church uses the word virgin. 

And it was still a while later when I realized what the Immaculate Conception is about, the conception of Mary by the act of love between Joachim and Elizabeth. Virginia Nesmith, our development director, and I used to work in a small office building for nonprofits. The woman in the office across the hall was Jewish and perhaps it was the Feast of the Immaculate Conception and she asked us what it meant. We told her and she said, “And they name playgrounds that?”  The Church is clear that we have bodies. 

Four years ago, Dec. 8, the Feast of the Immaculate Conception, was the appointed execution date for a federal prisoner named Lisa Montgomery. This was the end of President Trump’s first term and he’d ordered seven executions during November, December and early January. 

That set date of her execution — Dec. 8 — caught my attention and my prayer. 

Lisa wanted a child. She had been sterilized, her attorney says. And so she tricked a 23-year old pregnant woman, Bobbie Jo Stinnett, into letting Lisa into her home to sell a puppy. Lisa strangled Bobby Jo and used a kitchen knife to cut open her stomach and take the infant. The news didn’t mention Bobbie Jo’s child, except to say it was a girl. I imagine a 20-year-old woman, alive today, raised motherless. 

It was a terrible crime. Lisa confessed to the murder and, according to her attorney, she accepted responsibility for the act. A jury condemned her to death. Did we have the right to execute her? No. 

We don’t have the right to execute anyone, and we have the extra obligation to care for persons like Lisa with mental illness. Everyone agreed from the beginning that Lisa was mentally ill. She was sex-trafficked as a child and gang-raped as well, again according to her attorney, a federal public defender.

The very nature of the crime gives proof that she was mentally ill. In any circumstance we have the obligation to show mercy, but simple justice demands care for the sickest among us. Our God calls us to reject the “eye-for-an-eye” penal system and instead seek genuine justice.

Lisa was mentally ill, on death row. Her public defenders asked for a postponement of her execution because they both caught COVID-19 while visiting her in prison. The prosecutor argued that Lisa could prepare her own clemency appeal but the defenders said all she had in her prison cell was a piece of paper and a crayon. So a judge stayed the execution; it would not be Dec. 8. The date of Jan. 12 was set. Then a judge stayed that date but the appeals court put it back in place. I weep for Lisa. I don’t know if she had the capacity to weep for herself. The Supreme Court accepted the Appeals Court date and Lisa was executed on Jan. 12, 2021.

I keep thinking about that original execution date, the Feast of the Immaculate Conception. For those of us who contemplate Lisa’s life, along with Bobbie Jo’s and with Mary’s, we may find a paradox, that Lisa’s and Bobbie Jo’s desire for motherhood find expression in Mary’s conception. What seeds a child is a passionate explosion of love. Bobbie Jo was in the last month of her pregnancy, maybe a little afraid but full of hope and full of grace. It was that very fullness of Bobbie Jo’s human body and human spirit that drew Lisa. Pregnant women draw us all. That’s why the Church elevated Ann and Joachim’s act of love, the start of Ann’s pregnancy with Mary, into a Holy Day of Obligation. 

Pray for Lisa who was executed four years ago. Pray for Bobby Jo who was murdered 20 years ago. Pray for all the couples engaged in conceiving a child. And may Lisa and Bobby Jo pray for us. 

And with all I’ve said about conceiving a child, today is also the feast of us Sisters of Loretto,  chaste women who stand with Mary and countless sorrowing women. So we stand today, renewing our vows. Then the co-members will stand and we will declare our commitment to one another. 

A Common Commitment, Commissioned by the Forum 

Standing together because we belong to Loretto, we agree to live together in the spirit, support one another in realizing God is peace on earth, and continue creating a community of faith, hope and love. We are friends of Mary and friends to one another, committed to following the Gospel.

(All raise hands in blessing):

May this commitment to one another fill the House of Loretto with loving kindness.

May our common commitment strengthen us to work for justice and act for peace.

May our commitment inspire our lives every day everywhere.