Notice what happens in Luke 11 when the woman in the crowd starts praising Jesus as the object of adoration and his mother as blessed: Being made the focus of attention and adoration makes him nervous, perhaps even belligerent.

He is the signpost, not the Sign, and so he shifts the notion of “blessedness” from object to objective. “Blessed rather are those who hear the word of God and obey it.” Notice that he did not say blessed are those who hear the word of God and believe it.

in Saving Jesus from the Church