Word to the Wise
Friday, March 25, 2022 - March 25: The Annunciation of the Lord (tranferred if 3/25 is a Sunday, or if it falls during Holy Week or Easter Week - see the table below)
[Isa 7:10-14; 8:10; Heb 10:4-10; Luke 1:26-38]"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."....."Behold, I am the handmaid of the Lord. May it be done to me according to your word." [Luke]
It is easy to romanticize the scene of the "Annunciation." I am thinking, for example, of the mural by the great Dominican friar-artist, Fra Angelico at San Marco in Florence. It is a reflection of our own piety and the theological significance of the event. The human drama can disappear. Perhaps the best way to get to that dimension might be to ask any woman how she felt when she learned the first time that she was pregnant! To add to that, ask any woman who discovered she was pregnant, engaged and the dad is not her fiance'! And the child is going to become incredibly important to the whole world!! And the angel Gabriel says, "Do not be afraid?!!!!" It's a good thing that the evangelist Matthew reports another annunciation to Joseph, but that one also includes the drama of his initial decision to call off the wedding!!!
The "annunciation narratives" (both to Mary and to Joseph) are more theological than human. Scripture scholars tell us that each of the two was written in the light of the rest of the story. St. Paul's letters show almost no interest in Jesus' origins other than "born of a woman, born under the law..." [Galatians 4:4]. It was a gradual development of interest in Jesus' human origins that gave rise to adding those traditions by Luke and Matthew. The Gospel According to Mark has no "infancy narrative" and the Gospel According to John places Jesus' origins in eternity!
What shines through all of this is the faith of the woman and man who found themselves caught up in a bigger drama than their human one! It would not be easy to be the parents of Jesus! The focus today is on Mary and her consent, but just last week, we had the story of Joseph and his consent. Later on in the gospels, Jesus seems to distance himself from kinship ties, which may reflect later claims by family members!!!
We celebrate an incredibly courageous young Palestinian Jewish woman whose subsequent theological significance should not blind us to her personal faith and commitment that were tested by the annunciation and by her initial role in God's plan of salvation. AMEN