Gospel for Sunday, December 08: Luke 1:26-38
Immaculate Conception B. V. Mary
26 In the sixth month, the angel Gabriel was sent by God to a town in Galilee, called Nazareth, 27 to a virgin, betrothed to a man of the house of David, named Joseph. The virgin’s name was Mary. 28 Coming in to her, he said, “I greet you, O full of grace, the Lord is with you.” 29 At these words she was troubled and wondered what the meaning of such a greeting was. 30 The angel said to her, “Fear not, Mary, for you have found favor with God. 31 Behold you will conceive a son and give birth to him and call his name Jesus. 32 He will be great and called the Son of the Most High; the Lord God will give him the throne of David his father 33 and he will reign over the house of Jacob forever, and his kingdom will have no end.”
34 Then Mary said to the angel, “How is this possible? I know no man.” 35 The angel answered her, “The Holy Spirit will descend on you; the power of the Most High will spread its shadow over you. The one to be born will therefore be holy and called the Son of God. 36 See: Elizabeth also, your relative, in her old age has conceived a son, and this is the sixth month for her, whom everyone said was barren: 37 nothing is impossible to God.” 38 Then Mary said, “Behold, I am the handmaid of the Lord; let it be done to me according to your word.” And the angel departed from her.Lk 1:26-38
Dear sisters and brothers of Misericordia, I am Carlo Miglietta, a doctor, biblical scholar, layman, husband, father and grandfather (www.buonabibbiaatutti.it). Also today I share with you a short thought meditation on the Gospel, with special reference to the theme of mercy.
LUKE THEOLOGIAN OF MARY
The great narrator and theologian of Mary is the evangelist Luke. To him we owe the splendid paintings of the Infancy in which the figure of the Mother plays a leading role. Luke, more than any other evangelist, devotes attention to Mary; not only does he describe many episodes of her existence, but above all he develops an authentic Marian theology, presenting Mary as the figure of the true disciple and true believer. In the third evangelist’s vision Mary is the first “Christian,” the model of the Christian.
The Lucan account is a “midrash,” that is, a sapiential reflection on the historical facts of Jesus’ childhood, the result of post-Easter pneumatic contemplation. Da Spinetoli asserts that the message of the “Infancy Gospel” should be grasped at a threefold level:
1. explicit theology: the “titles,” the all-letter statements;
2. implicit theology: the revelations proposed through narrative devices, the deep meaning of the events set forth;
3. allusive theology: while Mt 1-2 narrates the infancy of Jesus by signaling the fulfillment in it of Old Testament prophecies (Mt 1:22-25; 2:5-6…), Luke communicates the mystery of Jesus through midrash, that is, by implicitly reading the historical facts according to the biblical model, and thereby proposing, to readers familiar with Scripture, profound values and revelations.
THE DIPTYCH OF ANNUNCIATIONS
Both the annunciation to Zechariah (1:5-25) and the annunciation to Mary (1:26-38) are described according to the biblical literary genre of “birth announcements,” by which the parents are pre-communicated about the conception of Ishmael (Gen 16:11-16), Isaac (Gen 17:4,15-22;21:1-3) and Samson (Jdg 13:2-24). The pattern is:
a) an angel announces the birth and reports a vaticinium about the unborn child;
b) upset of the recipient;
c) objection;
d) promise of a reassuring sign.
The announcement to Mary is also rooted:
1. in the pattern of “vocation narratives,” such as that of Moses (Ex 3:7-14;4:1-17), Gideon (Jdg 6:11-23), Isaiah (Is 6), Jeremiah (Jer 1), according to the pattern:
a) appearance;
b) fear;
c) divine message;
d) objection;
e) sign and name
2. in prophetic announcements of salvation to Israel: thus Luke makes Mary the personification of the chosen people. Mary,by her “yes,” is the obedient Israel (Ex 24:3,7);
3. in the creation and sin narratives of Genesis: Mary is the new Eve contrasting ancient disobedience (Gen 3): with Jesus a new creation will begin, reconciled with God;
4. in the apocalyptic model of Daniel 8-10: the sum of the chronological data marking the events is 490 days (6 months between the annunciation to Zechariah and that to Mary (1:26. 36), i.e., 180 days, nine months between the annunciation to Mary and the birth of Jesus, i.e., 270 days, 40 days between Christmas and the presentation of Jesus in the Temple (Lev 12:3), amounting to the 70 weeks of days of Dan 9:24 after which the Messiah would enter the Temple to “atone for iniquity, bring everlasting righteousness.”
5. in the theme, present since Exodus, of the cloud-Spirit-Presence of God (Ex 13:21; 14:20; 16:10; 19:9.16; 34:5…).
Diptych of announcements:
1. Gabriel appears to Zechariah in the temple (1:11), to Mary in a “city of Galilee” (1:26) “of the Gentiles” (Mt 4:14), in “the house”(1:28): transition from cultic religiosity reserved for Israel to an inner faith, open to all Gentiles.
2. Mary is the last of the great “barren ones” of the Bible: the “theology of barrenness” recalls how “the gift of the Lord are the children, his grace the fruit of the womb”(Sl 127:3). Here the barren Elizabeth becomes a mother because “the prayer” of her husband was answered (1:13), Mary by God’s free initiative.
3. Zechariah’s objection expresses doubt (1:18), and is punished with muteness; Mary’s is a request for enlightenment (1:34), and rewarded with the Spirit’s fertilizing grace (1:35).
MARY’S VOCATION
Luke presents Mary in an inaugural scene that has the specific task of characterizing the mother’s role: we usually speak of the annunciation narrative, but, according to the literary genre proper to the passage, it would be better to call this text “Mary’s vocation” (Lk 1:26-38). It is, in fact, a vocation narrative, very similar to the one in which the call of Gideon is narrated (Jdg 6:11-24): God, through one of his messengers, asks for cooperation from a human person in the accomplishment of a great undertaking. Gideon and many other Old Testament characters had been asked by God to cooperate with him to deliver the people of Israel from some difficult situation. The annunciation involves Mary, the Nazarene girl called to a unique human and spiritual adventure (Luke 1:26-38).
A Franciscan archaeologist, Bellarmino Bagatti, found a very ancient trace of early devotion in a Nazarene house then used as a place of worship by Judeo-Christians:
An inscription in Greek characters was found in the plaster. It bore at the top the Greek letters XE and, below, MAPIA. It is obvious to refer to the Greek words that Luke’s Gospel puts in the mouth of the announcing angel, “Chàire Maria.” Well, through that angelic communication, a sign of transcendent revelation, is outlined in Luke’s text as a small Creed that offers a perfect definition of Christ’s identity.
“In a land on the edge of Palestine, in an insignificant village, in a simple, unknown house, in an everyday family, the mystery of God’s humanization is realized: God, the eternal, becomes mortal, the strong becomes weak, the heavenly becomes earthly. The Apostle Paul, when he sought to sing this event in the Christian faith now professed by Jews and Greeks, would affirm, “He who was God emptied himself, becoming man” (cf. Phil. 2:6-7).
This unheard-of and impossible event for us humans happened because “all things are possible to God,” but how to tell the story? The truth to be expressed is that a man like Jesus, the Son of God who became mortal flesh, only God could give him to us. He could not be the fruit of human will, he could not be begotten by humanity alone, he could not simply be the son of a human couple. And here, to reveal the deep truth of this event, beyond what was visible in the eyes of the people of Nazareth, is a narrative that seeks to tell us how God intervened and acted, how Jesus is a gift that only God could give us
Here is the mystery of the incarnation, before which we can only worship, contemplate and give thanks. Only God could give us a man like Jesus, and to this gift he responded with an “amen,” a willing yes, Mary, the woman of Nazareth whom God chose by making her the object of his grace, his benevolence, his totally gratuitous love” (E. Bianchi).
“To Mary God asks for readiness and cooperation for the decisive event of the liberation of all mankind. The philosopher Johann G. Fichte in a sermon delivered on the Feast of the Annunciation to Mary, March 25, 1786, exclaimed, “Does it seem little to us that among all the millions of women on earth only Mary was the only chosen one who was to give birth to the Man-God Jesus? Does it seem little to us to be the mother of Him who was to make the whole human race happy and through whom man would become an image of the divinity and the heir of all its beatitudes?”(G. F. Ravasi).
Happy Mercy to all!
Anyone who would like to read a more complete exegesis of the text, or some insights, please ask me at migliettacarlo@gmail.com.