The Solemnity of the Annunciation of the Lord – 25 March

Again Lent’s austerity is interrupted as we solemnly keep a feast in honour of the Annunciation.   The Annunciation is a mystery that belongs to the temporal rather than to the sanctoral cycle in the Church’s calendar.   For the feast commemorates the most sublime moment in the history of time, the moment when the Second Divine Person of the most Holy Trinity assumed human nature in the womb of the Virgin Mary.   Thus it is a feast of our Lord, even as it is of Mary, although the liturgy centres wholly around the Mother of God.

The Church’s Year of Grace, Pius Parsch

The Annunciation, a tradition which has come down from the apostolic ages, tells us that the great mystery of the Incarnation was achieved on the twenty-fifth day of March.   It was at the hour of midnight, when the most holy Virgin was alone and absorbed in prayer, that the Archangel Gabriel appeared before her and asked her, in the name of the blessed Trinity, to consent to become the Mother of God.   Let us assist, in spirit, at this wonderful interview between the angel and the Virgin and, at the same time, let us think of that other interview which took place between Eve and the serpent.   A holy bishop and martyr of the second century, Saint Irenaeus, who had received the tradition from the very disciples of the apostles, shows us that Nazareth is the counterpart of Eden.

In the garden of delights there is a virgin and an angel and a conversation takes place-between them.   At Nazareth a virgin is also addressed by an angel and she answers him but the angel of the earthly paradise is a spirit of darkness and he of Nazareth is a spirit of light.   In both instances it is the angel that has the first word. ‘Why,’ said the serpent to Eve, ‘hath God commanded you, that you should not eat of every tree of paradise?’   His question implies impatience and a solicitation to evil, he has contempt for the frail creature to whom he addresses it but he hates the image of God, which is upon her.

See, on the other hand, the angel of light, see with what composure and peacefulness he approaches the Virgin of Nazareth, the new Eve and how respectfully he bows himself down before her:   ‘Hail, full of grace!   The Lord is with thee!   Blessed art thou among women!’   Such language is evidently of heaven, none but an angel could speak thus to Mary.

Scarcely has the wicked spirit finished speaking than Eve casts a longing look at the forbidden fruit, she is impatient to enjoy the independence it is to bring her.   She rashly stretches forth her hand, she plucks the fruit, she eats it and death takes possession of her, death of the soul, for sin extinguishes the light of life and death of the body, which being separated from the source of immortality, becomes an object of shame and horror and finally crumbles into dust.

But let us turn away our eyes from this sad spectacle and fix them on Nazareth.   Mary has heard the angel’s explanation of the mystery, the will of heaven is made known to her and how grand an honour it is to bring upon her!   She, the humble maid of Nazareth, is to have the ineffable happiness of becoming the Mother of God and yet, the treasure of her virginity is to be left to her!   Mary bows down before this sovereign will and says to the heavenly messenger:   ‘Behold the handmaid of the Lord, be it done to me according to thy word.’

Thus, as the great St Irenaeus and so many of the holy fathers remark, the obedience of the second Eve repaired the disobedience of the first, for no sooner does the Virgin of Nazareth speak her fiat, ‘be it done,’ than the eternal Son of God (who, according to the divine decree, awaited this word) is present, by the operation of the Holy Ghost, in the chaste womb of Mary and there, He begins His human life.   A Virgin is a Mother and Mother of Go; and it is this Virgin’s consenting to the divine will, that has made her conceive by the power of the Holy Ghost.   This sublime mystery puts between the eternal Word and a mere woman the relations of Son and Mother, it gives to the almighty God a means whereby He may, in a manner worthy of His majesty, triumph over satan, who hitherto seemed to have prevailed against the divine plan.

Never was there a more entire or humiliating defeat than that which this day befell satan.   The frail creature, over whom he had so easily triumphed at the beginning of the world, now rises and crushes his proud head.   Eve conquers in Mary.   God would not choose man for the instrument of His vengeance, the humiliation of satan would not have been great enough and, therefore, she who was the first prey of hell, the first victim of the tempter, is selected to give battle to the enemy.   The result of so glorious a triumph, is that Mary, is to be superior not only to the rebel angels but to the whole human race, yea, to all the angels of heaven.   Seated on her exalted throne, she, the Mother of God, is to be the Queen of all creation.   Satan, in the depths of the abyss, will eternally bewail his having dared to direct his first attack against the woman, for God has now so gloriously avenged her and in heaven, the very Cherubim and Seraphim reverently look up to Mary and deem themselves honoured when she smiles upon them, or employs them in the execution of any of her wishes, for she is the Mother of their God.

Therefore, is it that we, the children of Adam, who have been snatched by Mary’s obedience from the power of hell, solemnise this day of the Annunciation.   Well may we say of Mary those words of Debbora, when she sang her song of victory over the enemies of God’s people:  ‘The valiant men ceased and rested in Israel, until Debbora arose, a mother arose in Israel.   The Lord chose new wars, and He Himself overthrew the gates of the enemies.”   Let us also refer to the holy Mother of Jesus these words of Judith, who by her victory over the enemy was another type of Mary:  ‘Praise ye the Lord our God, who hath not forsaken them that hope in Him.   And by me, His handmaid, He hath fulfilled His mercy, which He promised to the house of Israel and He hath killed the enemy of His people by my hand this night. . . . The almighty Lord hath struck him, and hath delivered him into the hands of a woman, and hath slain him.’

–Excerpted from The Liturgical Year, Abbot Gueranger OSB