Saturday in the Third Week of Advent, December 21, 2024

Luke 1, 39–56

Mary set out and traveled to the hill country in haste to a town of Judah, where she entered the house of Zechariah and greeted Elizabeth. When Elizabeth heard Mary’s greeting, the infant leaped in her womb, and Elizabeth, filled with the Holy Spirit, cried out in a loud voice and said, “Blessed are you among women, and blessed is the fruit of your womb. And how does this happen to me, that the mother of my Lord should come to me? For at the moment the sound of your greeting reached my ears, the infant in my womb leaped for joy. Blessed are you who believed that what was spoken to you by the Lord would be fulfilled.”  And Mary said: “My soul proclaims the greatness of the Lord; my spirit rejoices in God my Savior for he has looked with favor on his lowly servant. From this day all generations will call me blessed: the Almighty has done great things for me and holy is his Name. He has mercy on those who fear him in every generation. He has shown the strength of his arm, and has scattered the proud in their conceit. He has cast down the mighty from their thrones, and has lifted up the lowly. He has filled the hungry with good things, and the rich he has sent away empty. He has come to the help of his servant Israel for he has remembered his promise of mercy, the promise he made to our fathers, to Abraham and his children for ever.”  Mary remained with her about three months and then returned to her home.

We can read the first part of this Gospel Reading — the visit of the Blessed Virgin Mary to Elizabeth — as an illustration of the Incarnation and Birth of Jesus Christ:  The Lord comes down from heaven to the “hill country”, the roughness of which signifies the unredeemed world.  He enters “the home” of the priest Zechariah, meaning that he came as a Jew to the Jews.  Zechariah being absent, signifying the indifference or rejection of the Jews, he is greeted by Elizabeth and the child within her womb, signifying those who truly longed for a Savior.  This is further signified by the child’s jumping for joy in Elizabeth’s womb.  Elizabeth then blesses Mary, who signifies all those who bring the Lord Jesus to the people of this world.  Mary then bursts forth with praise of the God who has entrusted her with this work.

At the heart of her praise is the theme of reversal, that God in his mercy casts down the rich and raises up the poor, that he humbles the proud and gives pride of place to the humble.  In all of this, we see Mary’s faith in God and in his promises.  She herself, a young peasant girl in a small, obscure, town, is lifted up by God to hold within her chaste womb his only Son.  Nowhere in her prayer does she extol her own virtues, and only speaks of herself as being blessed by all generations to come in order to emphasize how unheard of, unprecedented, it is that God has sent his Son among us.  In doing so, she reveals her understanding of herself as “the handmaid of the Lord”, the lowest of The slaves in a sizable household.  That is, she does not dare to speak of her own merits or accomplishments, or even of the key role she has played in her Master’s glorious deed.  This marks a great contrast: though Mary’s acceptance of God’s role for her as the Mother of his Son will result in all generations calling her “blessed”, as in awe of fiat as we should be, even greater is the work of the Incarnation.  This is the supreme condescension of Almighty God who hungered to save even those who had deliberately rebelled against him, sending his Son among us and taking on the nature of these rebels, signified by his Birth in a stable and his lying in a filthy manger, and to die by their hands.

May we, cleansed of the filth of sin by his Sacrifice join in the Virgin Mary’s wonderful hymn of praise in heaven.