“And Mary said: “My soul magnifies the Lord, and my spirit rejoices in God my Saviour, for he has looked on the lowliness of his servant. Behold, from now on all generations will call me blessed. For the Mighty One has done great things for me, and holy is his name. His mercy is on those who fear him from generation to generation. He has done mighty deeds with his strong arm; he has scattered the proud in the thoughts of their hearts. He has brought down the mighty from their thrones and exalted the lowly. He has filled the hungry with good things, and the rich he has sent away empty. He has cared for his servant Israel and remembered his mercy, as he promised to our fathers, to Abraham and his descendants forever.”” (Gospel of Luke 1:46-55)
The angel Gabriel comes to Mary, and they talk about the awaited miracle, about the child that this young woman – a teenager, in fact – will carry beneath her heart. Mary runs to her relative, Elizabeth, and they talk together about everything that is happening to them.
Photo: Combonianos.Brasil
Angels and women, the virgin and a woman in the prime of life, shape this Christmas story for us, while Joseph is given no word, and poor Zechariah has to keep silent for nine whole months, because he dared to speak back to the angel. From his waiting is born a song of praise, Benedictus (Blessed be the Lord!) – the one we say or sing at Morning Prayer or Lauds services; from Elizabeth is born the great prophet John, who breaks Israel’s centuries-long silence of prophecy. And from Mary, from a girl and the Holy Spirit, is born our Saviour Jesus, from the root of Jesse, at the darkness of midnight.
It is the voices of women that – in an extraordinary way – we hear in this story of the birth of Christ, and through their experience we ourselves carry it onward and give birth to it in our own lives, in lives kept apart – far from Bethlehem, far from the beginning of our era, and now apart from one another.
May the voices of angels speak to us, too, this year! And perhaps on this unusual, hushed Christmas Eve let us listen also to the very words spoken by Mary and Elizabeth, so that we, like Mary, may treasure these words within us, pondering them in our hearts.
The Board of the ALLWT wishes everyone a bright Christmas full of warmth!
Photo: MARIA MÃE DE DEUS, Combonianos.Brasil, www. combonianos.org.br