The Solemnity of the Immaculate Conception of the Blessed Virgin Mary

December 8, 2020

Luke 1:26–38

The angel Gabriel was sent from God to a town of Galilee called Nazareth, to a virgin betrothed to a man named Joseph, of the house of David, and the virgin’s name was Mary. And coming to her, he said, “Hail, full of grace! The Lord is with you.” But she was greatly troubled at what was said and pondered what sort of greeting this might be. Then the angel said to her, “Do not be afraid, Mary, for you have found favor with God. Behold, you will conceive in your womb and bear a son, and you shall name him Jesus. He will be great and will be called Son of the Most High, and the Lord God will give him the throne of David his father, and he will rule over the house of Jacob forever, and of his Kingdom there will be no end.” But Mary said to the angel, “How can this be, since I have no relations with a man?” And the angel said to her in reply, “The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you. Therefore the child to be born will be called holy, the Son of God. And behold, Elizabeth, your relative, has also conceived a son in her old age, and this is the sixth month for her who was called barren; for nothing will be impossible for God.” Mary said, “Behold, I am the handmaid of the Lord. May it be done to me according to your word.” Then the angel departed from her.

The fifth century Greek hymn, “The Akathist of the Theotokos” presents a dialogue between the Blessed Virgin Mary and the various persons associated with her in the time between her virginal Conception of the Lord Jesus and his Birth.  At the end of the prayer, the Archangel Gabriel stands before her, struggling to know how to speak to her: “Gabriel was rapt in amazement as he beheld your virginity and the splendor of your purity, O Mother of God, and he cried out to you: ‘By what name shall I call you? I am bewildered; I am lost! I shall greet you as I was commanded to do: Hail, O Woman full of Grace!”  It is a most beautiful and moving hymn.  The Greek Orthodox usually chant this during Lent.  Due to its structure, we learn to marvel at what has happened to the Blessed Virgin through the reactions of Gabriel, Elizabeth, Joseph, and others.

In the hymn and in the Scriptures, Gabriel calls Mary “Full of grace.”  This is used in place of her proper name.  In this way, Gabriel reveals to Mary and to us God’s own name for her.  Now, the Greek word thus translated that Luke uses is not found in this form anywhere else.  It is: κεχαριτωμένη, a perfect passive participle indicating that an action has been completed in the past.  Probably the best way to translate the word is “she who has been perfected in grace.”  This is different from, say, “she who was perfected in grace”, which is in the imperfect tense.  The latter indicates a process that has been completed.  The perfect, however, indicates that the action was completed at the time it was undertaken.  And this is the Immaculate Conception of the Blessed Virgin Mary: at the instant of her conception she was perfected in grace so that at no time did the darkness of Original Sin affect her.  

This freedom from Original Sin affected not only her actions, but her outlook and her personality.  Since her conception, her will has been turned towards the will of God   Calling herself the “handmaid of the Lord” provides us with her own understanding of what “she who has been perfected in grace” means, as a “handmaid” would be born into a life of servitude and would depend entirely on her owner for her existence.  For the willful who rebelled, this would be a miserable state of affairs, but for one who gloried in her owner, no treasure or false freedom could hold any allure.  

She reveals something of her heart in her Magnificat, which she sang before her cousin Elizabeth: “My soul magnifies the Lord; my spirit rejoices in God my Savior.”  Her soul always “magnified” the Lord, that is, proclaimed his greatness through the service of her life, and she rejoiced in God her “Savior”.  This line is worth examining, for while she cries aloud that she glorifies God for what she knew God to have done for her in the past and the present, her calling God her “Savior” tells us something else that she knew.  Now, in the Psalms David calls God his “Savior” after he has escaped danger or been victorious in battle: “I call upon the Lord, who is worthy to be praised, and I am saved from my enemies” (Psalms 18, 3).  In her praise of God she shows an awareness that God has saved her in a special way: she knows well that her Son will save the human race, but she emphatically calls God my Savior.  On some level she knew of her Immaculate Conception and was rejoicing in it.  God had saved her from the enemies that afflict all of us, the devil and sin, but he had saved her in a way that most wonderfully prepared her for her unique part in his plan of salvation for us.

Today we rejoice with her, and in her, for by her prayers her victory is ours, and her Savior, our own.