From the Rector

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Dear Friends in Christ,

I hope you'll bear with me as I reflect back on last week's celebration of the Feast of the Annunciation of Our Lord, which the Church observes each year on March 25—nine months before we celebrate the Nativity of God's Son. The Annunciation marks the moment when the angel Saint Gabriel announced unto the Virgin Mary the message that she would conceive and bear the God's Son.

The Golden Legend, a medieval collection of saints' lives by the 13th-century Dominican theologian Jacobus de Voragine, beautifully recounts this mystery. Voragine shares the words of Saint Bernard of Clairvaux on Gabriel’s greeting, “Hail, full of grace":

"In her womb was the grace of divinity, in her heart the grace of charity, upon her lips the grace of courtesy, in her hands the grace of mercy and generosity. And she was truly full of grace, for of her fullness captives have received redemption, the sick their cure, the sorrowful their comfort, and sinners their pardon; the just have received grace, the angels joy, and the Blessed Trinity glory and honor, and the Son of Man the substance of human flesh."

Voragine also tells of the overshadowing of the Virgin by the power of the Most High:

"A shadow is formed by light falling on a body. The Virgin, as a human being, could not hold the fullness of divinity; but the power of the most High overshadowed her, while the incorporeal light of the godhead took a human body within her, and so she was able to bear God."

And then, with urgency and wonder, he imagines the angel’s call for Mary’s response:

"O Virgin, make haste to give thine answer! Answer a word and receive the Word, utter thine own word and receive the Word of God, pronounce a word that shall pass and embrace a Word that shall not pass, arise, run, and be opened!"

At last, the Virgin Mary speaks: 

"Behold, the handmaid of the Lord; be it done to me according to thy word."

Voragine then tells a story, one I find hard to forget:

"A rich and noble soldier had renounced the world and entered the Cistercian Order. But he was so unlettered that the monks, ashamed of his ignorance, set a teacher to give him lessons. But the lessons were of no avail: he could learn nothing save the two words, Ave Maria, which he went about repeating all day long. when he died, and was buried with the other brethren, it came to pass that over his tomb there grew a lovely lily, on each of whose petals were inscribed in letters of gold the words Ave Maria. Deeply stirred by this great miracle, the monks cleared the earth from the grave, and saw that the roots of the lily sprang from the dead man's mouth. Thus they understood the great devotion with which he had pronounced these words."

In Lent, we journey with Christ toward Jerusalem, following him into the wilderness of the world and along the road that will lead to his Passion, death, and resurrection. This is our call and reply that mirrors Mary's own, to take up our own cross and follow her Son, and the grace and strength of Christ’s resolve to face his suffering is our hope.

And so, I return to the Annunciation. Blessed Mary, the Mother of God, stands near Christ’s throne in heaven and intercedes for us. She loves her Son, by whose death and resurrection we are saved, and she loves us, who look with hope to her faithfulness, for as God took flesh in her womb, so too is Jesus born in our hearts. There is joy in singing again and again the words of the angel’s greeting, for she is the Mother of Jesus—Divine Mercy and Grace made man.

Ave Maria, full of grace, 
The Lord is with thee. 
Blessed art thou amongst women, 
And blessed is the fruit of thy womb, Jesus. 
Holy Mary, Mother of God, 
Pray for us sinners, 
Now and at the hour of our death. Amen.

Grace and peace be with you as we journey together toward Jerusalem. 

Faithfully yours,

Fr. Peter

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