Homily for the Fourth Sunday of Advent

As we begin this final — and abbreviated — week of Advent, expectancy fills the Gospel stories, and literally so, as we hear in today’s story.

Earlier this month, on the Feast of the Immaculate Conception, we heard the story of the Annunciation in which God reveals to Mary the role He wishes her to take in Salvation History. The Archangel’s opening words began the somewhat frightening revelation of God’s request: “Hail, full of grace, the Lord is with thee…” suggested, though veiled, in today’s Gospel.

We hear today the Story of the Visitation, in which humanity, in the person of Elizabeth, recognizes this two-fold truth:

+ that Mary is full of Grace

+ that the Lord is with her.

Elizabeth wastes no time with pleasantries in their meeting; she proclaims with immediacy, “Blessed are you among women, and blessed is the fruit of thy womb!” — and continues — “… and who am I that the Mother of my Lord should come to me?” Elizabeth’s unsolicited affirmation: her recognition of what the Archangel had proclaimed, inaugurates the Church’s recognition of Mary’s central place in the Church.

Obscure a figure as she might be, Elizabeth suggests Mary’s role as co-Redemptrix from the beginning, a title the Church will pick up centuries later.

The late Father Richard John Neuhaus, in his book, “Death on a Friday Afternoon,” notes: “It is not too much to say that Mary’s consent to the announcement of the angel that she was to be the mother of the Messiah, made our salvation possible. To be sure, the death of Jesus Christ on the Cross made our salvation possible, but without Mary’s consent, that would not have happened. Mary’s Fiat, her “Let it be” inaugurated the central act of Salvation History.”

The Blessed Virgin’s faith, then, is not just a personal virtue for her own good, it gives rise to the entire New Testament.

The late Saint John Paul II wrote, in his encyclical Redemptoris Mater: “Just as Abraham in hope believed against hope that he should become the father of many nations, so Mary, at the Annunciation, having professed her Virginity in the words ‘How can this be, since I do not know man?’ believed that through the power of the Most High, by the overshadowing of the Holy Spirit, she would become the Mother of God’s Son, in accordance with the Angel’s revelation.”

So, the central human figure in Salvation History now shifts from Abraham to Mary. Sons of Abraham are to find their truest identity in

+ the Son of God

+ the Son of Mary.

In the Visitation story, we are given a peek inside the wombs of Mary and Elizabeth: the Gospel, as it were, in ultrasound. Here is how Saint Anselm describes the scene:

“Elizabeth was the first to hear the voice,

but John the first to experience the Grace.

Whereas the natural sound of words rang in his mother’s ears,

John rejoiced in the mystery of what the words meant.

Elizabeth felt Mary’s presence at her side;

John: the closeness of Mary’s Son.

The two women spoke of Grace,

but their sons experienced the grace,

and communicated that gift to their mothers in such a way that,

in a double miracle, both women began to prophesy,

inspired by their sons.”

The dialogue between the mothers-to-be reveals life as a blessing, and children as the best embodiment of this outlook. At this same moment, the two boys, in their mothers’ wombs, virtually dancing salvation into being, gives, perhaps, the greatest pro-life witness in human history.

What we have here in the Visitation story is the Christian life in microcosm. These two pregnant women care for one another both physically and spiritually. They show us, in sharing their stories, and in their mutual care, that God is encountered both in prayer and in service to neighbor.

Mary’s words at this meeting, the Magnificat, “My soul proclaims the greatness of the Lord…” (which we don’t get to hear this year) expresses not only her outlook, but her whole plan of life. In her lowliness, this handmaid of the Lord shows her greatness: that God is at the center of her self-knowledge to the point of being ego-free as she completes her statement: “… my spirit finds joy in God, my Savior.”

In a single sentence, she demonstrates the Three Great Theological Virtues: Faith, Hope, and Charity, which are nearly perfected in her life.

How so?

She is a Woman of Hope

Because she believes in God’s promises and awaits the salvation of Israel, the Archangel can visit her and call her to the decisive service and fulfillment of these promises.

She is a Woman of Faith

Elizabeth recognizes Mary’s faith as she states: “Blessed is she who believed that the Lord’s words to her would be fulfilled.” Mary’s Magnificat — a portrait of her soul in words — is entirely woven from threads of Scripture. Mary is at home with the Word of God in that she thinks and speaks with the word of God, and the Words of God becomes her words.

She is a Woman of Charity

We see this in her quiet gestures: in the house at Nazareth… in her care for Elizabeth… and in her later responsiveness at the Wedding Feast at Cana. In the end, when the Disciples flee, Mary will remain at the foot of the Cross. Later, at the hour of Pentecost, they who first gathered around the Lord, now gather around her as they wait for the Holy Spirit.

In her faith, her hope, and her love, Mary is truly the Mother of the Church.

How, then, shall we make this Gospel story our own story? The pregnancy of both Mary and Elizabeth comes as a result of their openness to God’s Will, and becomes the context of God’s revelation of His love and of His plan for them. For Elizabeth in her advanced years, it is astonishing; for Mary in her youth and virginity, it is miraculous.

Our own bodilyness, then, becomes the place and the context of God’s work in all of us. In the Letter to the Hebrews which we heard this morning, it is written “When Christ came into the world, He said, ‘Sacrifice and offering you did not desire, but a body you prepared for me.’”

In Baptism, our bodies, graced by the Sacrament into Temples of the Holy Spirit, become Christ’s dwelling place in the world, second only to the Eucharist. While our souls are God’s life-force within us, they act within the context of our bodilyness, our senses, and our capacity to reason.

Our Lord Jesus Christ, who took on our human bodilyness, instructs us how to redeem that bodilyness, our senses, our reason and thought. In this passage, He says further, “Behold I come to do your Will, O God…” not once — but twice — which is significant because God will never demand of us that which He will not give us the grace to accomplish.

Our Lord’s “Behold I come to do your Will” finds its perfect echo in Mary’s “Behold the handmaid of the Lord.”

The literal pregnancy conceived in Mary’s body by virtue of her Fiat, her “Let it be done unto me…” gives birth to a sort of “spiritual pregnancy” in which those who say “Yes” to the Father’s Will, will find the stirring of the Living Word — that is — the quickening of Christ dwelling within them.

If we bear Christ within, the souls of others may well begin to recognize Him there. (Remember Jesus and John in their mothers’ wombs!) If we speak of God’s promise, they will respond: some, perhaps with incredulity and a suggestion of privatization of religion, but others might find grace-responding-to-grace: a faith which might once have been theirs, will tug at their their souls, revealing, or perhaps renewing, God’s claim on the essence of their being.

The faith, hope and love of the Blessed Virgin Mary will come forward to those who are renewed in belief that the Lord’s promises would be fulfilled, and the lives of many of us can begin to unfold the next chapter of the Visitation story.